


Distance in Time

by Sagartolen



Series: Distance in Time [1]
Category: Mystery Skulls Animated
Genre: Amnesia, Angst and Feels, Blood and Injury, Character Death, Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Dissociation, Drama, Fix-It of Sorts, Flashbacks, Gen, Heavy Angst, Hellbent, Melodrama, Mind Control, Original Character(s), Originally Posted on Tumblr, POV Alternating, Panic Attacks, Possession, Spoilers, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-09-27
Packaged: 2019-10-03 11:15:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 21
Words: 50,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17283014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sagartolen/pseuds/Sagartolen
Summary: Arthur falls off a cliff and lands in the past.(Previously titled 'MSA time travel idea')





	1. Traveling to the Past 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fic I started writing on Tumblr several months ago, which I have now decided to start posting here. I'll probably be updating this slowly so if you want to read ahead on the slightly less edited version you can on my Tumblr account: [pi-cat000](http://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Not all the parts will match up with the chapters because I will be condensing some of them.

_ “Lewis?” _

_ Arthur’s grip falters as the ghost’s hold loosens. Air rushes past, pulling at his hair and clothes. The ghost, Lewis, rapidly shrinks, gravity pulling him away. _

_ Half-formed memories pool about beneath his surface thoughts, dragging his attention away from the death currently rushing to greet him. Visions, tinted green, of caves, many tailed beasts, and red agony, flash by. The world is fuzzy, no longer making any sort of reasonable sense. Lewis was dead. A ghost. All that time spent searching and Lewis was dead. Something rips through his back and up into his chest. A brief flash of sensation akin to pain.   _

_ And he lands heavily on something soft. _

Arthur violently spasmed, throwing himself up, flinging himself to the side. He rolled and there was the brief sensation of falling followed by a sudden thud. It stunned him long enough for his mind to catch up to his flailing limbs.  

He’s not dead.  Not impaled. He’s lying on a hard surface, smothered in tangled cloth. Whatever it is folds around him, warm and comforting. Arthur, panting, forced himself to still, listening to his hammering heart and hash breath. A blanket is draped over his head. It’s not the hard rocks and spikes he was expecting.

Shakily, Arthur reached and gripped the cloth, pulling it down. Sunlight, warm and yellow, hit his face and he squinted up. There’s a familiar window partially blocked by an equally familiar bed. He’s lying on the ground next to a workbench, head resting adjacent to his comfy work chair. He twitched, pulling himself partially upright, looking about wide-eyed. This is his room. In the sudden silence, he can just make out the metallic hum of equipment and distant shouts of the mechanics on shift in his Uncle’s shop.

He’s home.

Arthur swallowed nervously. What? A few seconds pass while he processed the sudden change of environment. Nothing jumped out at him. Nothing moved. There’s no purple ghost calling for his blood. He’s alone. Slowly, his breathing evens out. For a second he entertains the notion that it was all a dream. A horrible dream. The thought dies quickly. No. These last two years hadn’t been a dream as much he would like them to be. But perhaps the ghost… Lewis… dropping him off a cliff…his heart skipped…

_ He was struggling, left arm useless and limp, trying to grab a handhold as he was dangled precariously over the cliff’s edge. His head was swimming, vision blurred, all he could hear was his hash panting and the angry crackle of fire. _

Arthur took a deep breath, steadying his nerves. It had to be a nightmare. It had to be. His eye’s flickered around, searching for reassurance. Last he remembered they had been on a road trip, travelling away from the mansion and one very angry ghost. He wracked his brain for something that wasn’t a nightmare car chase/crash in the desert. Had he dreamt everything up? When had they arrived home? Oh god, he hoped he wasn’t losing time. Vivi was bad enough, they couldn’t both start blanking out.

Shakily, he glanced about for his phone. He needed to know the date. He needed to know which parts of the last few days were dreams and what was real.  

The phone was where it always was. On his bedside table. Carefully, Arthur pushed himself to his feet and was taken off guard at how light he suddenly felt. It had him stumbling to the side. Off-balance he reached out to steady himself and yelped at the sudden discomfort travelling down his left arm when he missed his grab for the nearby chair. His arm…it was…

_ His body is moving, reaching out without his impute. He is trying to yell but nothing is working. His arm is twisting, being ripped away. Red. There’s red. His vision is failing. Where’s Lewis? Vivi… _

It took several deep breaths for Arthur to push the Cave away, corning it off in the back of his mind. All the while he stared at his arm, healthy and whole, attached to his body like it hadn’t been ripped off by a demon dog. Maybe he had it wrong. Maybe  _this_  was the dream. Maybe he was still in that cave, impaled on stone spikes, and this was a final death hallucination. People had those, right? Unsteadily, he reached with his newly flesh arm to pick up his phone. It worked just like a regular arm with sensory impute and everything.

The date on his phone is wrong.

Arthur gaped, trying to process that alongside everything else. He switched it off then back on, flipped through his settings and checked the internet connection. The phone didn’t seem broken. Arthur’s eyes slid from his phone to his arm then back again. Slowly, he scanned his room, picking out all the odd things he hadn’t noticed in his panicked awakening and tumble out of bed. The computer at his desk was out of date and the spare parts he used and kept around for maintenance were missing.

Arthur squashed the budding hopefulness growing in his chest. He needed another source of information. He needed to correlate data. Whatever this was…It probably wasn’t good.

With a jerky, slightly unbalanced, step, Arthur quickly moved to the door, hurrying down the stairs. 

He slips into the garage via its back door, inhaling the lingering smell of oil and petrol. It’s strangely comforting. Lance is standing with his back to him. He’s motioning to his assistant Darrel, leaning over an open car engine and pointing at something of interest. Around them, spare parts and various tools are hung in their places along the walls and stacked neatly on selves. The mundane sight is a balm to his completely shot nerves.

“Arthur,” his Uncle greets jovially, eyes still fixed on the car, “There you are. Get over here and take a look at this beast,”

Arthur automatically takes a step and hesitates. He’s is in his pyjamas, a lose faded t-shirt and shorts, and completely barefoot. Definitely, not workshop approved attire.

Lance steps back off the low foot-bench, used to reach into the tricker parts of car engines, glancing back, “Poor bastards broke down a few miles up.  New-fangled electric hybrid engine so I’ll get ya to take a look at it before anythin.”

Their eyes meet and he trails off, giving Arthur a once over. Lance immediately frowns and Arthur can practically hear the lecture on workshop health and safety forming in his Uncle’s head.

He quickly steps back into the doorway and blurts, “Sorry, um, could I borrow your phone for a second?”

Lance crossed his arms unimpressed, “Ya know that crap about shoes in the workshop is there for a reason, right.”

“Sorry, Sorry,” Arthur rubs the back of his head with his left hand. It’s nice to be able to do so without getting the strands caught in metal panels, “I, uh, forgot….”

“Hey Arthur, catch,”  Darrel, thankfully, interrupts his muddled excuse, tossing his phone from across the room.  Arthur spends a good few seconds fumbling the item, trying to adjust to his heightened levels of coordination. Mercifully, he doesn’t drop it. He shoots Darrel an appreciative glance.

“The password’s 1234,” Darrel grins and Lance gives them both an unimpressed stare.

“Thanks, Darrel. I’ll just go and…uh…get dressed?”

He starts to turn and beat a retreat. This is obviously not the time for attempting conversation, his was mind fumbling for sentences worse than usual. He hesitated mid turn because finding another phone had  _not_  been his objective when coming down here.

“Could you tell me the date real quick?” He asked, forcing himself not to fidget. Lance is now looking more concerned than annoyed, squinting at Arthur like he’s trying figure something out. His Uncle is blunt and to the point, hiding his inherently perceptive nature under a layer of grumpiness. He probably knows somethings up. Hopefully, it would be attributed to a poor nights sleep.

“It’s the 4th”

“and the year?”

Now Darrel is also looking confused, “2014?”

“Right. Thanks,” Arthur spins on his heel marching away, avoiding any incoming ‘are you okays’ and ‘Is something wrongs.’ It’s not the smoothest of exits but he honestly wasn’t feeling up for any more conversation. Not when his mind is buzzing with impossibilities.

Arthur walks straight back to his room. The old lock on his door is back and he fixates on it briefly before pushing inside.  His room is warming, morning light still spilling through the window. It catches on the peach-coloured wallpaper, giving everything an orange glow. It’s comforting and Arthur seats himself at a surprisingly sparse desk. There’s a small stack of notes filled with calculations and he puts Darrel’s phone down on top of them after quickly checking the date. Then he turns on his computer and checks there as well. It’s all the same. 2014. He glanced around for Galahad who was nowhere to be seen. Neither is his cage or tricked-out running wheel. But that makes sense. He had bought Galahad a year ago, meaning it would be a year until he saw the hamster again. Confusing and disappointing. He could really use a Galahad right about now.

So… date confirmed. 2014. He doesn’t know what it means and part of him still wants to grab his keys, drive into town, and question more people. The how’s, what’s and why’s circle around his head, leaving him at a loss.

Was he suffering a mental break? Was this the afterlife? One minute he’s falling and Lewis is… _Lewis is_ … and the next minute he’s in bed and all the evidence is pointing to it being two years earlier. Only, that’s impossible, because time travel is impossible. Just like ghosts were supposed to be impossible. Arthur frowns, massaging his head. He had learnt  _that_  lesson the hard way. Answers, as par for the course, elude him.

Reluctantly, he dredges up recollections of The Cave. In his mind, it’s a muddled mess of twisted horror and agony. For the last two years, it had been a clouded nightmare, drawing him down into sharp teeth and pain. He was loathe to revisit it, especially now, when his mental facilities and energy were a few moments away from a complete meltdown. Arthur poked at the memories anyway, trying fruitlessly to dig up answers. He remembered entering the cave, walking down into the dark. Lewis’ form up ahead, torch in hand.

_ Something sliding into this mind, ripping him open. He was trapped in shadow. There was no way out. Ahead of him, Lewis walked, touch light dimming. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. _

Nope. None of that. Arthur refocused, chocking off the worst of it. A few seconds of breathing exorcizes and re-centring later and he tried again. He remembered entering the cave. Losing sight of Lewis. Mystery. Losing his arm. Vivi’s panicked face before passing out. Then he had awoken in a hospital to lots of questions and no answers. Everything useful twist away, out of reach, taunting him. Police investigations had turned up nothing. Lewis was just gone. Not even a body left behind. The only one who probably had any clue was Mystery but the dog fluctuated between cagy to annoyingly vague on the details.  Arthur had never pressed for more. Maybe he should have. If Lewis had died that night and Mystery had known. Had known all along. Then Mystery had watched as he and Vivi drove from one side of the country to the other, searching fruitlessly. No… Mystery had watched  _Arthur_  searching. Vivi had just been along for the ride, humouring his chase, all memories of Lewis gone.

Unsteadily, he ran both hands through his hair, pulling lightly at the strands and taking solace in the sensation. If that ghost was Lewis. Then Lewis had died. He had probably died in The Cave, making Lewis the purple ghost who had tried to…in the same cave…had succeeded…in…killing…

_ His left-hand sparks, sending small shocks through his shoulder. It’s beyond trashed but the sensation gives him enough awareness to move it up in a jerky action. In his desperation, he manages to hopelessly cling to the ghost’s arm. _

Arthur rests his forehead down against his desk, curling up around his restored arm. Phantom pains run up and down its length. He’s breathing heavily again, gasping for air.

_ Suddenly it’s Lewis. Lewis is there but his face is twisted and hateful.  _

It takes a lot more than a few seconds but eventually he succeeds in pushing the memories and fear away, finding an equilibrium again.

_ Why? _

The question hangs uncomfortably, weighing on his mind. With the information he has he doesn’t understand. There’s a lot he doesn’t understand now.

Arthur sits up and uncurls, leaning back on his chair to stare to the ceiling. Shakily, he wipes his face, rubbing the damp from his eyes. It doesn’t matter. Mystery. Lewis. If he  _was_  two years back in time then none of it mattered. Just more fuel for the nightmares, which would now be returning with a vengeance. He had been doing so well up until the mansion, managing a regular sleep schedule with seven full hours a night and everything.

For now, he leaves the conundrum alone, looking around for a distraction. There’s nothing of interest and he can’t for the life of him remember what he should be working on at this point in time. When had he finished that online engineering course? 2013? Arthur gets dressed and heads down to check out the hybrid engine his Uncle had mentioned before his abrupt exit.

Lance gives him a  _look_  when he returns but doesn’t mention Arthur’s odd behaviour. Darrel is there and he returns the guy's phone, waving off another greeting. He slots back into the workshops routine without issue, listening to his Uncle and Darrel talk over their recent acquisition as he examines, dismantles and reconstructs.  

Just as he’s feeling some sense of normality, relaxing into the work, there’s a familiar yell of greeting from outside the garage. Through the open roller doors, on the other side of the chain-link fence designed to keep out the general public, Vivi is waving to catch his attention.

“Hey! Arthur! Hey! Can you let us in the front! No one’s answering. I told you, you need a better doorbell!”

Uncle Lance straightens, shaking his head.

“That girl,” he huffs, turning to Arthur, “How about ya go let your friends in before someone decides to climb a fence. I think I got this covered.”

Arthur stares at Vivi who is still waving, attention shifting. Next to her is a familiar purple-clad shape. He’s standing, hands tucked casually in pockets, watching Vivi yell with a fond smile. Any form of relaxation instantly evaporates.

It’s Lewis.


	2. Traveling to the Past 2

Arthur is caught somewhere between overwhelming joy and crippling fear.  It freezes him in place and whips his breath away.  Why are they here? Why now? He’s not ready!

“Arthur?”

Lance breaks Arthur from his frozen indecision, prompting action. He breathes in and holds for a count then exhales.

“Right. Yes. Okay,” Arthur puts down the wrench he’s holding, “I’ll go get the door.”

Lance’s eyes are following his jerky movements, and he’s definitely going to be hearing about this later. That’s a problem for future Arthur. Right now, it’s time to go face his long-missing, maybe dead, possible ghost, best friend.

He stiffly walks into the house.

“It’s okay. Everything is fine,” Arthur muttered under his breath, approaching the front door cautiously. He’s already had his freak-outs for the day while upstairs in his room. No more freak-outs left. That’s totally how it worked. This would be fine. 100% A-Okay. All he had to do was act normal and not like someone who’d just lived through the most horrifying experience of their life. As easy as falling off a log.

The small reception room, separated from the workshop and the rest of the house by thin fibreboard, is dark. The blinds are pulled down over its large windows and the wooden door, which is usually wedged open to welcome any clients, is locked. Arthur glances about, hesitating before moving to the door. Right… He’s usually the one to open the front reception in the mornings. It’s not a big deal, clients usually called ahead, so they didn’t get many walk-ins. He still feels a bit guilty about the forgetfulness.

Arthur rests a hand on the doorknob. On the other side, he can hear the muffled chatter of Vivi and the lower tones of Lewis. Immobile, unable to summon the courage needed to turn the handle, Arthur stands silently. He breathes in, holds, and exhales. Just breath. Vivi is outside, and he needs to see Vivi. The last time he had seen her she had been in the back of a crashing van. He needs to know that she’s okay. And Lewis…he just needs…to know…that Lewis is…. _Lewis is there and his face is twisted into a hateful glare_.  He needs to know that Lewis is not dead and not trying to kill him. Unsurprisingly, this last thought fails to inspire movement. He exhales again, shaking the image from his head.

How about this…If he doesn’t open the door, Vivi is probably going to go climb in through the garage window or something, and Lance would never let him hear the end of it. She’s done it before.

One last deep breath and he pulls open the door. An eyeful of the bright desert sun causes him to squint. It’s not overly hot, but the driveway’s grey ash-felt still makes the air shimmer and dance. Lewis leans in, throwing him into shadow and blocking out the view.

Lewis is alive, smiling, and he’s rubbing the bridge of his nose in that exasperated way he does when Vivi says something particularly bewildering. It’s everything he could ever want, but all he sees is  _purple and anger_. 

_He briefly meets Lewis’s glare and even with blurry vision, he knows there is nothing but fury and rage. Arthur’s grip falters. Air rushes past. Stone spikes rip into his back and up through chest._

“Arthur!” and Vivi is jumping into him. The sudden contact shocks him back into the present.

“Finally! I thought you’d gotten distracted on your way over and we’d have to walk back around and pester Lance.” she pulls back and shakes his shoulders, feigning hysteria.

“He’ll double ban me from the workshop. You wouldn’t do that to me, right? Not even for some fancy techno-do-dad.”

Despite shot nerves, strung out facilities, and mental exhaustion Arthur finds a small smile tugging at his lips. Vivi is fine. More than fine judging by the way she’s gripping his shoulders.

“I’m not that bad,” he mutters, adding- because Vivi’s energic personality is contagious- “and I’m pretty sure you were banned because you tried to sneak in that one time on Halloween,”

“Psf. Ancient history,” Vivi waves the sentence away like an annoying fly, stepping back to give him space,  “also, ‘not that bad.’ You say that, but I bet a hundred bucks you forgot we were coming today.”

“Uh,” he stalls because there is no denying that he definitely forgot they were coming, though not for the reasons Vivi was probably envisioning.

“How about we actually get through the door before we start harassing people,” Lewis’s chuckle interrupts, and Arthur’s eyes dart up. Lewis is leaning against the doorframe, watching Vivi do her verbal poking routine with an air of amused acceptance. He receives a sympathetic ‘what can you do’ shrug from the larger man and the normality of the action throws his head into a spin.

Arthur, suddenly feeling very out of place, allows Vivi to pull him inside. Mystery-he hadn’t even noticed the dog, being hyper-focused on Lewis-pads in on Vivi’s heels, scooting around their legs, putting him in front of the group. The twinge of unease Mystery inspires is easier to ignore, him having had a lot of practice at it. However, he’s definitely not comfortable being wedged in the small entryway between the two of them.

“I don’t harass people,” Vivi is amused, chattering, glancing over her shoulder at Lewis, “Harass is such a strong word. Arthur tell him I don’t harass people,”

Arthur goes to respond, but everything just seems to be  _too much_. He wants to say, ‘no, no harassing going on here,’ maybe with a hint of sarcasm to prompt further ribbing. Lewis would then comment something deadpan, and Vivi would laugh some more. It’s what he wants to happen.

The words get stuck, and he remains silent.

Vivi huffs and gives him a playful elbow. The teasing energy dissipates somewhat.

“Hey, so where _is_ the van?” Vivi picks up, switching tracks, “I didn’t see it out the front where you usually park. I hope you moved it somewhere with shade. It’s going to be killer doing anything under direct sunlight. ”

The question causes his brain to panic briefly, and he riffles through possible reasons for Vivi to be asking about his van. The way Vivi frames it makes it feel like he should know something obvious.

“I left the paint in the car,” Lewis is speaking now, he’s still by the door, trying to position it so it stays wedged open, “I didn’t want to lug it into the house then have to carry it back out and around the building or something,”

Vivi leans toward him, covering part of her mouth so Lewis wouldn’t see her whisper, “Heads up. Lewis bought  _a lot_  of paint,”

Lewis obviously heard Vivi’s loud whisper because, when he steps inside, his cheeks have reddened. The small darkened room, despite now being lit by the open door, is feeling unpleasantly claustrophobic.

“No one said anything about what colour we were actually using, and the sales assistant was pushy,” Lewis starts explaining and is interrupted by Vivi.

“Yeah, and I thought that blue was a given. But nooo… you got purple and  _four_  different shades of orange.”

“It’s Arthur’s van Vivi,” Lewis comments like his reasoning is obvious.

The conversation inspires a wave of Deja Vu, and the scenario finally clicks in Arthur’s head. If it’s the 4th of the 1st then that means they’re two weeks out from beginning the disaster trip. He vaguely remembers painting the van around this time with their new ‘Mystery Skulls’ logo. Lewis had bought several cans of orange paint which had ended up being too much, even for a large van like Arthur’s. A lot of random objects had gotten an orange makeover that week.

“I thought you’d want it to be orange because you know …” Lewis gestures at the orange Tee and apricot-brown pants he’s wearing,  “…and there were a few different ones to choose from at the shop, and the saleswomen said she’d give me a discount…”

Lewis is staring at him now, and Arthur is transfixed. Lewis’s eyes, just visible through his puff of lilac hair, are filled with humour and slight embarrassment. No hate. No fury. No sudden drop onto unforgiving rocks. It doesn’t matter because his vision is tunnelling like he’s peering through a fish-eye lens. He needs to get away but he can’t because then they would  _know_.

“Ah,” he coughs, cutting into Lewis recount of getting duped into buying extraneous amounts of paint, “Don’t worry about it…” Maybe he would have found the situation more humorous if he wasn’t stuck in an emotional deadlift.

“…the van’s in the scrap yard behind the shop. So we don’t get paint on the driveway…” he manages as he surreptitiously shuffles around Mystery so his back is too the door, “Sorry. I just need to run to the bathroom real quick. You guys can get started without me.”

His voice is little more high pitched then he would have liked, but it doesn’t seem to alert Lewis or Vivi who seem more inquisitive than anything.

“Sure,” Lewis nodes slowly, pointing back over his shoulder with a thumb, “we’ll just unpack the stuff we bought for lunch. Can’t leave it in the car for…”

Arthur doesn’t hear the rest because he has already backed out of the room, practically running down the hallway. His breathing is hard. Really hard. It’s fine. He’s out of sight, and that’s all that matters right now. Somehow he makes into the bathroom, locking the door and everything else outside.

. . .

 

_The ghost doesn’t care for his struggles, holding him easily in one clenched fist. The area around him burns an angry purple, heavy and suffocating. There’s no doubt to what the ghost intends to do, and Arthur freezes up lest he hastens his demise with a misplaced kick. Below are rows of jagged stone, glowing lavender-grey. The scenery is painfully familiar. Visions of The Cave briefly pull him from one distressing state into another. For a moment the ghost disappears and is replaced with sickly green. Something is sliding into this mind, picking him apart. Couldn’t breathe. Green. Ahead of him Lewis walks, disappearing into churning shadows. He reaches out, but it’s too late. Lewis is gone._

_His left hand sparks, sending small shocks through his shoulder. He’s back with the ghost and the cliff, frozen against gravity. His arm is gone and its mechanical replacement is a mess. Still, the sparking pain gives him enough awareness to move it up to hopelessly cling to the ghost’s arm._

_Their eyes meet, and even with blurry vision, he knows there is nothing but fury and rage._

_A burst of angry purple._

_“Lewis?”_

_The world is fuzzy and he’s falling. Lewis’s glare follows his decent, face unmoving in his hate. He slams onto the twisted spikes, chest breaking open._

_And he’s…_

He’s lying on his back, staring up at an off-white ceiling speckled with mildew. The fluorescent light flickers once, and he blinks spots from his vision. There’s a hurricane, whipping his memories around, making it hard to focus. Even lying against the cold ceramic tiles, he’s feeling hot and stuffy.  _Where’s Lewis? What happened to the cliff?_  For a second he is terrified and sick to the stomach. It tugs him down, threatening to swallow him up. He waits, focusing on the smell of damp towels and occasional water drips, and the moment passes. Carefully, he lifts his left hand and stares, wiggling his flesh fingers around. The bathroom, his bathroom at Lance’s place, is quiet.

Right…time travel…He’s two years in the past.

“Ha,” he exhales. What is his life?  

Arthur starts on his breathing: in on four, hold for seven, then eight out. Slowly, he feels out his natural rhythm, and everything around him begins to feel more real. So much for no more freak-outs. He pulls himself upright and explores along his head. No bumps or scrapes so he must have been able to control his decent or had sat down at some point. He doesn’t remember. The blurry vision is probably a side effect of shallow breathing. Not enough oxygen to the brain and stuff. It’s been a while since he’s had a full-on dissociative blackout violent enough that he’s been unable to manually pull himself free with controlled breathing and meditative exercises. A sign that the Lewis Situation has affected him more than he would have liked.

Usually, when he has these sort of troubles, he would talk to Vivi, and maybe Lance if he’s really desperate. Not exactly an option here. Not right now anyway. Arthur leans forward, rubbing his eyes with the base of his palm. He’s still shaky, head swimming, but the fear is tapering off, winding back to its more manageable cousin, anxiety.

Next, he stands, moving slowly to test his balance. Somewhat light-headed, he twists the sink’s tap, running water to splash on his face. As he does, he catches sight of his reflection for the first time since waking up. Their eyes connect, and it’s like meeting a weirdly identical doppelganger.  

Two years isn’t a long time. Not long enough to really make any significant changes to appearance. Not at his age. Yet, the person that watches him from the mirror is a world younger. People say that stress ages you, and -now examining his reflection- he’s inclined to believe them. There are no dark circles under this person’s eyes, his face is full, and he’s practically glowing. All indicative of a balanced diet and plenty of sleep. It’s strangely unsettling, and he immediately hates it. Hates the younger him for having everything and still managing to be unhappy. For taking everything for granted.

What did younger Arthur have to be upset about? The minuscule chance that Vivi and Lewis would ditch him for some inane reason which had probably made sense at the time? A fear of becoming the ‘dreaded’ third wheel? Forget that noise. He’d settle for not being hated/maimed, watching his friends be happy together and not whatever broken things they’d turned into. Even if the watching occurred at a distance, he would be happy. ‘At a distance’ might even be optimal because the one thing he now knows for sure is this: He is NOT the younger Arthur.  He turns abruptly away and exits the bathroom, running a hand over his face as he goes.

And he almost slams into Vivi who’s standing right outside. It nearly sends him straight back into a panic.

“Arthur,” Vivi stumbles back, hand raised as if just about to knock, “Don’t open doors like that. You scared the shit out of me.”

“Hehe,” he breathes out, glancing around. Neither Mystery or Lewis are in the hallway. It’s just him and Vivi. Slowly, he relaxes enough and responds with relief boarding on amusement, “I scared you? You almost gave me a heart attack. Maybe next time don’t stand so close to doors you know might open at any second.”

Vivi snorts, then fixes him with a more concerned expression, “Well, you were in there for a while. I came to check up on you. Was kind of worried you’d drowned in the toilet or something.”

“Uh, thanks Viv, but, as you can see, I have not drowned,”

“So you say…” Vivi rubs her chin, taking in his damp face and hair.

Then one of Vivi’s hands is on his forehead and the other on her own, comparing their body temperatures. He tries to keep his breathing at a normal tempo. It’s still slightly faster than usual, not helped by Vivi’s jump scare.

“You feel a bit clammy, but not overly hot. So that’s good I guess.”  Vivi is now staring him right in the eye, face scrunched in consideration.

“I did splash water on my face…”

She leans in close, moving her hand from his forehead to pull at his cheek. So Vivi had noticed something was off. Lewis had probably picked up on his odd behaviour as well. Great. Vivi moves the second hand up to squeeze his cheeks together like she’s trying to reorganise his face. It’s kind of awkward.

“I’m fine,” he tries, batting her hands away, attempting to gauge just how worried Vivi is before saying anything too incriminating.

“You sure? You seem a bit… peaky,”

“Yeah, I mean,” he rubs the back of his head, “I woke up with a migraine this morning. It’s been kind-of distracting and causing a bit of nausea.”  Arthur snaps into ‘excuse mode’ with disgusting ease, quickly running through possible causes for his odd behaviour. He taps his head and put on the old ‘everything’s good smile.’

“It’s not bad enough to put off the painting though. You guys were looking forward to that,” It wouldn’t have fooled the other Vivi, future Vivi, who had developed an almost supernatural ‘Arthur bullshit detector,’ as she called it.

“Oh… Is that what’s wrong. You should have said something. It’s not like we’re on a strict timeline so we could have rescheduled,”  _this_ Vivi nods in acknowledgement, humming thoughtfully, “maybe you should stay away from the hard labour. Just for today, I mean. Me and Lewis can do the painting if you’re not feeling too good.”

“Yeah, that’s probably for the best,” he relaxed back a bit, “I’ll just take it easy,” and maybe avoid Lewis for a little longer because he was so many levels away from ready that he might as well be floating in outer space.

“Actually, I have a new project I’m working on so I’ll probably be spending some time upstairs,” he adds to give himself another excuse.

“Owo, new project,” Vivi lights up, energy returning, “what’s this one about. Are you finally making that ghost detection devise? It is, isn’t it? Please tell me it’s the ghost detection device… Wait,” Vivi puts her hands on her hips, glaring, “is this why you have a headache, because you were up all night.”

His next smile is genuine because Vivi always makes him smile, even when he feels guilty for lying.

“Haha, yeah,” He runs his fingers through his hair, “you got me.”

“I knew it,” Vivi puffs, giving him a light punch in the shoulder. He manages to contain the automatic flinch.

“I told you, water and sleep. It’s the best way to keep headaches away especially in the summer. You  _have_  you been drinking water?” The last sentence is said in a way that is almost threatening.

Arthur actually laughs at that one, “Yes, I’ve been drinking water.”

Well, younger Arthur has been drinking water. Probably.

“Obviously, not enough if you’re nauseous. Come on, I think I actually have peppermint tablets in my wallet that’ll help,”

He acquiesces to Vivi pulling him in the direction of the kitchen, grateful she’s not about to push him for details. Gone are the days when Vivi would pester him until she was 100% sure he was okay and not downplaying anything. They’re left behind in a never-to-be-lived future with his, most likely, dead body. If he had any say in it those days would never come again.

Right now he’s running on empty, but, as soon as he has space to plan, he would get all this sorted. Or as sorted as he could manage. The bar to success is pretty low, so his chances are good. He’s just been given the motherload of second chances, and he’s not about to screw it up, anxiety, panic attacks, and dissociative amnesia notwithstanding. He’s going to protect Vivi and Lewis from that messed up future no matter what.

For now, he needs to focus on getting through the rest of the day.


	3. Traveling to the Past 3

Arthur’s kitchen isn’t big, being squashed into a corner of the large, warehouse-like building to make more room for the garage and repair shop. Its small, two element stove and shoe box oven are balanced out by a wide kitchen sink and large granite benchtop. The benchtop, doubling as a table, splits the living room from the kitchen, so the two spaces bleed into each other. It means that, when he enters, he can see from one end of the area to the other.

“It’s all good. Arthur’s not dying, he just has a headache and is nauseous,” Vivi proclaims, jostling him through the door, “You can stop panicking.”

Right now, he’s wishing there _is_ a wall separating the space because both Lewis and Mystery are watching him. Lewis with open concern and Mystery in that subtle, sidelong fashion he does to avoid arousing suspicion. It’s simultaneously too open and too enclosed. Arthur hides a grimace under the guise of rubbing his eyes. He would have rather just slipped into the room unnoticed. His heart rate is already increasing, and Lewis hasn’t even done anything yet.

“I wouldn’t say we were that dramatic. Just concerned,” Lewis elaborates. He’s next to the stove, cooking something which is omelette-looking but is probably a whole lot fancier.

“Have you been…”

“He  _says_  he’s been drinking water,”  Vivi finishes, anticipating the question.

Before he can say much about it, he’s sitting up at the bench with a full glass, and uncomfortably close to Lewis. Just don’t look him in the eye and avoid the colour purple…so just don’t look at Lewis period…simple really. Mystery has positioned himself under the adjacent stool and appears to be attempting a nap, but who could really tell with Mystery. He stares at the water in his glass, regretting his decision to follow Vivi and wishing he could sink into the ground.

“It’s probably not a great idea to be painting outside, in the middle of the afternoon, in the desert, under direct sunlight,” Lewis comments, tapping his spatula against the side of the pan, “So, lunch first, and maybe it’ll cool down later. Then we can paint.”

“Also, I’m hungry, and you should probably eat as well,” Vivi saves him from responding, rifling around in her bag.

“It the meantime,” Vivi dumps a stack of maps and travel vouchers in front of him, spreading them out, “we’re going to do something far more interesting: itinerary planning.”

A half-amused, half-longsuffering, sigh from Lewis’s position at the stove tells Arthur this isn’t the first time Lewis has seen this particular pile of pamphlets and guides. He, also, vaguely remembers spending a lot of time pouring over them during his first time around. However, what he remembers with greater clarity are feelings of exclusion, when Vivi and Lewis did most of the planning without him. Thinking back, the exclusion probably hadn’t been intentional or even that bad. Vivi and Lewis just saw each other more, both living in the town proper and dating, so of course, they would discuss an upcoming road trip more frequently.

“Oh, here you go Arthur.”

He stares at the small packet of tablets Vivi is holding out, “Grans’ go-to nausea cure, she’s old school like that, let me know if they work.”

“Thanks,” He mutters, taking the packet. He spends an extended amount of time reading the instructions to avoid talking or engaging with Lewis. ‘Peppermint Tablets: Specially formulated blend of peppermint, fennel, and ginger oils. Calm and relax the digestive tract…’

He should have escaped into his room when he had had the opening earlier.

“Drat…” Vivi exclaims, frowning at the pile, “I forgot Hauntings a History in the car. I’ll be back in a second.“ She’s out of the room before Arthur can process. Suddenly, it’s him and Lewis with no energetic blue buffer between them. Definitely should have gone straight to his room….Should he make an excuse and go to the toilet again? Tell Lewis he’s about to throw up? It’s not far from the truth.

No. He can’t run to the bathroom every time he’s left alone with Lewis. It is best he starts acclimatising to this as quickly as possible because they are two weeks out from a road trip where it’s going to be the three of them, alone, for over a month.

Arthur sneaks a glance away from his water glass and peppermint tablets, studying Lewis out the corner of his eye. He is humming softly to himself, facing sidewards, concentrating more on cooking than on Arthur. Ask about his family! His brain screams unhelpfully. It’s something the younger Arthur would ask….or maybe ask how the restaurant is doing. Lewis always has funny stories about weird customers or interesting insights into goings-on around town. Arthur lived too far out to get in on the really juicy stuff, missing a lot of the gossip these small towns ran on.

_This is your best friend!_

He can’t say anything because his mouth is suddenly dry. Lewis sprinkles some sort of colourful garnish into the pan.

_A best friend who had thrown him off a cliff._

Lewis is happy, a small smile is playing across his face.

_Why? Why did you do it Lewis? What had he done wrong?_

_Was it because he didn’t search hard enough? He had tried so hard, had poured so many hours into scouring for clues, spent so much time searching. Not hard enough. Never good enough. Perhaps if he had found Lewis sooner, he wouldn’t have been so mad._

“This is almost ready if you want to grab plates.”

Arthur flinches at the sudden address. His heart rate speeds up, ignoring the logical side of his brain telling him that  _this_  Lewis is fine and there are no cliffs around for him to be thrown off of.  

“Right,” He forces out, standing to shuffle through his carboards in search of plates and enough cutlery for the three of them. Lewis is  _watching_  him again, frowning ever so slightly, following Arthur’s stiff movements. The sizzle of cooking food dies as the stove is turned off, leaving an awkward hush.

“How are you feeling? Are you still nauseous?”

Determinedly, he dodges the larger man’s gaze.

“Uh, I’m okay…um, Vivi gave me peppermint.”

Arthur places the plates before Lewis, careful to avoid Vivi’s stacks of paper. They clank against the stone counter, impossibly loud in the drawn-out silence which stretches in the aftermath of his sentence. Lewis, brow still creased ever so slightly, dishes out his culinary creation. When the hell is Vivi getting back?

A plate touches down in front of him, and Arthur immediately shovels food into his mouth, ignoring the burn. It’s a good excuse not to talk.

Lewis makes an aborted hand motion, commenting weakly, “Careful, it’s hot?”

Arthur’s eyes are watering now, and he nods because, yeah, it’s really hot, reaching for his untouched glass of water. Lewis, looking a more bewildered than anything, shakes himself, making to attempt conversation.

“So, you know that dude in leather who tried to punch you last week because you took a dig at his motorcycle.”

Arthur doesn’t.

“Turns out you were right about the fault with the engine, apparently his mechanic pulled a fast one, he came into the diner to say thanks. Thought you might want to know.”

Oh yeah…right, he had forgotten about that. Leather guy: mysterious stranger and subject of many a conspiracy, had stayed in town for two weeks then vanished off into the sunset. This was a conversation he had had with Lewis before, in the future. Arthur swallows his food, and it burns his throat.

“Was I right about the gang thing?” He asks. There…he had contributed and said something normal and Arthur-like.

“Not that I’ve heard, apparently he’s visiting an older relative. Though, no word on who the relative is.”

“Weird,” Arthur forces, hoping his feigned interest doesn’t look as wooden as it feels. The door to the living room slams open, rescuing him from having to contribute further.

“You boys aren’t gossiping again are you, I swear you’re worse than a couple of old ladies at a coffee shop,”  Vivi’s got sweat on her brow and is holding up a large, tome-like book triumphantly in the air.

“It’s not gossip if it’s true,” Lewis jokingly disagrees, throwing a side-glance at Arthur. This would usually be the point in their interplay where he’d loudly object to being called an old lady, justifying his interest in rumours as academic. Vivi had never been a fan of small-town gossip unless it was cause to tease him and Lewis. After returning from The Cave and being the centre of it for weeks on end, he understood why.

He misses his opening and Vivi interjects straight-faced, “Keep telling yourself that Lew but I know nosy, and you’re walking an awfully thin line with that granny chatter,”

Vivi dumps her heavy book on the bench, eye’s snapping towards the food. Expression brightening, she leans forward to inhale, “That smells gooood.”

Lewis sits down, handing her a plate which is almost overflowing, “I can’t help that people like to tell me their problems.”

“Don’t get crumbs on my maps,” Vivi orders, eagerly reaching for the platter,  pulling it close. They are now all seated around the pile of paper and several books, all supernatural in nature. Though Lewis and Vivi continue to chat, they’re both now throwing him the occasional concerned glance. He’s going to have to get better at this because he can’t have a migraine for the rest of his life.

 

To Arthur’s enormous relief the glances gradually taper off, attention refocusing back onto their upcoming trip. Quietly, he chews and listens, watching Vivi grow increasing animated, waving and pointing towards her giant ghost book, marking spots of interest on her map.  He’s not the only one. Lewis is also mostly quiet, content to watch with a dumb, wobblily smile plastered across his face. He vaguely remembers finding the expression vexing at one point. Now he’s just happy that Lewis is alive to make said expression.

“Obviously, I expected there to be a heap ‘haunted’ places around the state. I didn’t think there’d be this many though,” Vivi makes a sweeping gesture over the paraphernalia decorating the table. She’s mid-way through comparing tourist flyers to entries in Hauntings a History, finding them increasingly disappointing.

“Which would be great except I’m pretty sure half this stuff is a poorly executed tourist trap,” She punctuates her sentence with an angry bite of food.

“It is the middle of nowhere. Towns have to attract revenue somehow,” Lewis points out humorously. Vivi hurriedly chews and swallows to continue.

“Yeah, but some of this is just dumb,” She pushes her plate aside and pulls out several flyers, describing aloud, “some old stockroom with a ‘haunted’ sign,” She throws the pamphlet in Arthur’s direction, and he catches it before it can land in his food.

“A bunch of random ‘creepy’ houses with no history of murder, stabbing, disaster or anything!”

“That is tragic,” Lewis adds between mouthfuls.

Vivi bats the comment away, continuing, “and over twenty haunted diners in this state alone, what…is there a vengeful ghost of food poisoning?”

Lewis’s lips quirk into a wider smile while he gestures with his spoon in Vivi’s direction, “Food poisoning  _is_  pretty terrifying. The angry spirit of health regulation and proper food handling may very well be stalking these fair highways.” He glances meaningfully at a flyer sporting the name Greasy Ghosts, “I’d be afraid if I worked in one of these places,”

“Ooh, scary,” Vivi exclaims, wiggling her fingers in Lewis’s face, “I didn’t think of that. We should  _definitely_  go to every haunted diner between here and California to stop this misguided spirt.”

“If you get ‘cursed’ eating weird food I’m going to say ‘I told you so.’”

Vivi sniggered, snorting, “Love you to, Lew.”

Warm joy flares, settling in Arthur’s stomach and soaking through to his chest. It’s good to hear Vivi and Lewis talking again, enjoying each other’s company. They’re so happy together it’s almost blinding.

“Arthur, we need a tie-breaker,” Vivi turns hopefully towards him and Lewis mirrors her. Arthur freezes, and the warmth in his chest dissipates.

“Ghost diners: legitimate or tourist trap. What do you think?”

The weight of their combined attention is intense. They’re expecting something, studying his reactions, trying to gauge his state of mind.  It’s a tiny bit- see completely- overwhelming, and he stumbles over his own brain, getting stuck in a dead zone between happiness and fear. Thankfully, he makes it past the initial wave of discomfort, staunchly avoiding Lewis’s gaze and focusing on Vivi enthusiastic smile. Had it really been two years since he’d seen her happy like this?

“Uh… They’re, probably, tourist traps…” He starts, then continues because he has no idea who’s side of the argument is who’s at this point, “But you never know with ghosts… Who knows why they do the things they do,” He trails off, tries not to think about the sentence too deeply, and adds, “I mean, we don’t even know if they’re real so it could go either way.” The warmth in his chest dies to be replaced by brittle cold.  

“Spoken like a true fence sitter,” Vivi proclaims, shooting him a brief, troubled glance before turning back to Lewis, “Guess we’ll be going to check out a few of these ‘haunted’ diners then.”

“I won’t be able to cook like this all the time while we’re on the road so we’ll need to stop for food eventually. Might as make it part of the experience,” Lewis laughs.  Vivi mutters about tourist traps and scams under her breath, pulling out a map and marking down several dots.

“You missed one,” Lewis points down over Vivi’s shoulder and immediately has his hand slapped away.

Arthur stares at the two of them then glares at his almost empty plate. Not everything is his fault. He knows this. Knows that he can’t expect himself to find a solution for everything. He moodily pushes the last of his food around with a fork. Vivi had once described her memory loss like a mist or fog, obscuring her recollections and a significant chunk of the last five years. When she had tried recalling anything Lewis related the fog sucked her in, leaving her empty-eyed and vacant for hours on end. She had stopped trying after a while. It hadn’t really affected her personality, Vivi had always been energetic to a fault, but her smiles had been less. Often she would start a sentence all excited then trail off confused. Arthur had tried to make up for the loss, but it had caused more frustration than anything. Of course, post-Cave hadn’t all been doom and gloom, they’d had plenty of laughs and good times between the bad. Not like this though.

The grateful relief, which seeing Vivi had inspired, is now tempered by a creeping sense of failure.  _Had it been enough? Had he been enough? Maybe that’s why Lewis had thrown him off the cliff. He’d clawed his way out of the afterlife because Arthur wasn’t good enough_. His chest tightens, cutting at his breath.

Arthur stands, plate now empty, carrying and dumping it into the sink. Vivi and Lewis both turn back towards him. He can practically see the question marks hovering above their heads.

“I’m going to go upstairs for a bit. Sorry…maybe I’ll be back down a bit later,” He needs to leave before he starts spiralling into another panic. With how bad his last one was…He doesn’t want to worry them and ruin their good time by falling unconscious. It would also raise a lot of uncomfortable questions he would rather not answer.

“Are you sure?” Lewis begins to rise, seemingly about to reach out. Maybe to pat or touch his shoulder. _Purple fire. Hate. A hand gripping his shirt._  Arthur swallows nervously and surreptitiously ducks the incoming contact, skirting around the bench so it’s between them.

“You can always chill in the shade and just watch us paint if you want. Or lie on the couch? We can talk a bit quieter,” Vivi adds, gesturing towards the couch which runs parallel to the bench and splits the living area in two.  

Arthur waves the suggestion away, pausing on his beeline to the living room door,  “Yeah, um. Thanks, but I’m really not feeling too well. Uh, the keys to the van are hanging by the door…if you need them.”

Vivi and Lewis share a fleeting glance and some hidden message passes between them.

“Okay,” Lewis sits back down from his half rise, “let us know if you need anything,” 

Arthur tries for a smile, which he is sure comes out as a grimace, and, for the second time that day, flees.

.  .  .

Now the sun is no longer feeding through the window, his bedroom is cold and uninviting. Arthur stands at his door, staring at the weirdly empty space. He needs to reacquire some of the equipment he’d accumulated and collected during his recovery and subsequent arm building. Without it, everything feels bare.

Arthur sits at his desk and stares at his computer’s blank screen. So much for acting normal. Vivi, Lewis and Lance all probably know that something is wrong. He supposed it was a big ask, to act normal, considering the events of the last few days.

 _Purple and an angry glare. A sudden drop. Lewis. Why?_  Arthur rubs the back of his neck, moving his hands into his hair to tug at the strands. 

_Why?_

_Had Mystery known?_  Had Mystery deliberately misguided him because he too believed that Arthur deserved to be dropped off a cliff.  

He’s not sure where to start with either of them. He can barely look at Lewis and thinking about Mystery leaves him cold and tired. Not for the first time, he wishes he was better at compartmentalising, separating out his past experiences from the present. If future Vivi knew what he was thinking she’d probably smack him over the head and scold him about blaming himself for things beyond his control. Heck, this Vivi would probably do the same if she knew. 

He boots up the computer, typing in a location which practically burned into his brain. The Cave. There’s not a lot of information- there hadn’t been any information before, or any of the other million times he’d searched, either  -just a few missing person reports, some local superstition about lost souls, and a bit of vague lore concerning an unnamed demon.

There are no answers, but it’s  _something_. Something Arthur knows to avoid.

It’s the first step in saving Lewis and Vivi from his future. Maybe, when he has a chance, he can point an actual supernatural specialists in its direction. For now, he’s going to keep both of them as far away from it as possible.

And, maybe, he’ll also succeed in being a better Arthur. Not the Arthur they’re used to- the younger Arthur feels like he’s a world away at this point- but an Arthur who deserves to  _not_  be thrown off a cliff.

Outside he can hear Vivi and Lewis talking. There’s a low rumble, which he recognises as belonging to his van’s engine. They’re probably moving it into the shade of the building.


	4. Living in the Present (Vivi)

Imagine Nation Books was a pretty poor excuse for a bookshop despite what its’ title implied. Vivi glared at the store’s most recent delivery, two boxes of magazines, lifestyle monthlies, tabloid nonsense, and other mental fodder. She can feel her IQ dropping just reading the titles. There is nothing new or interesting book-wise, just last season’s releases, and she stacks the excess stock onto one of the storeroom’s crowded shelves with a tad more aggression than was strictly necessary. Better to take out her abnormal levels of discontent on the surplus stock than on customers. No doubt half of it would sit on said shelves until they rotted away. Mrs Gale, the aged women who ran the bookshop/newsagency/café hybrid, had an aversion to chucking out old stock, meaning the mouldy storeroom was perpetually cluttered. Kind of a shame, really. This had probably been a pretty cute bookshop at one point.

“Hey! Vivi!” The muffled shout echoes through the closed timber door, and she pauses to listen. There is no follow up.

“What?” She yells, and there is the sound of muffled feet outside. Katheryn, fellow employee and general pain, cracks the door and pokes her head partway in. She’s grinning in that excited way she does when she’s about to make a ‘hilarious’ or ‘insightful’ observation at Vivi’s expense.

“Your  _boyfriend’s_  here,” Katheryn almost sings, “and he’s chatting up Gale. Better watch yourself Viv, that woman’s a cougar deep down,”

Vivi wrinkles her nose, casts her eyes to the ceiling for strength, and huffs “Oh, put a lid on it.” She pushes Katheryn’s smirking face back out of the storeroom. The door clicks shut, and she’s alone again. Quickly, she packs away the remaining pile of magazines, glancing at her watch while she works. Her shift is a few minutes off ending. Finally. Vivi doesn’t hate working- she actually enjoys it quite a bit-but the cramped, overcluttered shop is stifling even on a good day. With her newfound motivation, she is done with the stock in record time, freeing her from the stale storeroom. Katheryn is standing just outside when Vivi exits, using a nearby shelf as cover to send a text message, and she has to do a bit of expert sidestepping to avoid a collision.

Across the store, just visible over the hodgepodge of mismatched shelves and paper-stands, Vivi spots Lewis’s ridiculously puffy hair. Skilfully, she weaves her way around an overflowing rack of newspapers, revealing that Lewis is, indeed, chatting to the far shorter Mrs Gale. No surprises there. Lewis, being unnaturally friendly, couldn’t walk two steps without getting drawn into someone’s life story.

At this distance his eyes are mostly obscured, drawing extra attention to the broad smile he hits her with the moment she’s within view. The itchy frustration and discontent, which has weighed on her mind throughout the day, loosens upon seeing him.  

“Vivian, dear,” Mrs Gale turns, following Lewis’s shift in attention, “Is it five o clock already? I’ll have to tell the girls to start closing the registers. These summer days always seem far too short.”

“Yup. Sure are,” She agrees, shooting a glance at Lewis, “Feels like it’s only been ten minutes since my shift started.”

It’s extraction time. No way she’s getting drawn into another ‘lovely weather we’re having’ exchange. Vivi is a, ‘Hi how are you’ and ‘maybe remembering a name if she likes them,’ sort of girl. Mrs Gale is okay, for a boss, but she did tend to drone on if given a chance.

“It was nice talking Ma’am. I’m sorry to hear about your ankle,” Lewis misses the memo, continuing his conversation like the overly polite guy he is.

“Oh, don’t you worry about it, dearie. Which reminds me, Vivian, I don’t suppose you could let your father know…”

“The medical practice is open seven days a week, I’m sure he’ll love to hear all about your ankle in person,” She cuts in before Mrs Gale can get started on describing her most recent ailment. She looks slightly affronted, but Vivi has already grabbed Lewis’s arm and is marching him out the door,

“Have a nice afternoon Mrs Gale,” She waves back, catching a disproving frown.

A bell chimes as they exit.

“Smooth,” Lewis remarks, stepping down onto the cracked pavement outside.  The sun is hanging low in the sky, casting an orange tint on the mostly empty street and sidewalk.

“Zip it, buster,” Vivi retorts, poking him in the chest, “You can’t give people a leg in this place, or they’ll be taking your ear off in no time. I just saved fifteen minutes of your life.”

“That’s not how that saying goes,” Lewis remarks, glancing down, amusement colouring his tone.

She waves a hand, “Same difference. Besides, she’ll forget about it before my next shift… Probably. Hopefully.”

“Something to look forward to tomorrow,” He jokes.

“Exactly, I can’t have a boring shift, that  _would_  be a disaster, ”

While she’s talking, she subtly weaves in front of Lewis, powerwalking to reach the car first. It’s harder than it should be because her legs are significantly shorter. Lewis’s eyes track her speedy overtake with bemusement.  When they had ‘officially’ started dating Lewis had tried very hard to be all gentlemanlike, which had included the opening of every door Vivi tried to walk through while in his presence. It had driven her a little bit nuts. This was her ongoing revenge.

She reaches the car, grabs the driver side handle, and holds the door open with a flourish.

“I’m never going to live that down am I,” Lewis snorts, bending down to slid into the small car.

“Nope,”  

Lewis starts the car’s engine and waits until she’s seated. They’re parked right outside the bookshop, and there is maybe one or two cars stopped nearby. Aside from the occasional vehicle funnelled through from the motorway, the main street is dead.

They sit in comfortable silence while Lewis pulls out, U-turns, and zips away. Until they hit the edge of town and turn onto the road which would take them to Arthur’s, half an hour out, everything is okay. Then the tension begins to creep in on them. Is it just her or does Lewis seem a bit off? There are not a lot of things that can penetrate Lewis’s generally positive outlook and good natured, go with the flow, attitude. The first was trouble with his family and the second was…the same thing that was bugging her, actually. Arthur’s sudden, odd behaviour has her a bit bothered as well.

“Soooo, how was work,” She tries because maybe she’s projecting and Lewis is fine.

“You know, same as usual,”

That definitely didn’t sound like the Lewis she knew. Where was the animated recount of the restaurant’s most recent hospitality disaster? She shifts in her seat so she can stare directly at his face. Lewis is staring at the road and seems fine. Vivi notices his knuckles tightening around the steering wheel. Yup. Something was eating at him.

“Okay, spill. What’s eating you. You’ve been all mopey for the last few days,”

It’s better to ask anyway, just in case her suspicions are wrong.

Lewis is silent for a few seconds, “Have I done something…I don’t know….bad or offensive recently?”

Okay…not  _exactly_  what she’s expecting.

“No,” She says slowly, “You’re the same as always,”

There is another silence. Vivi can tell Lewis is mulling over something in his head.

“Why do you think you’ve done something offensive?” She prompts because when Lewis gets like this its best to pull the band-aid off or he’ll sit in quiet contemplation for hours.

Lewis’s eyes flicker to meet hers then return to the road.

“I can’t shake the feeling that Arthur’s avoiding me,”

She can hear the frown in his voice now. He’s speaking carefully, like someone who’s given something a lot of thought and gotten stuck. She wants to immediately deny it. Instead, she casts her mind back to their last three meetings with Arthur. Arthur  _had_  been very skittish, quieter and more withdrawn. There had been fewer jokes, and he hadn’t really joined in on any of her teasing or ribbing.

She hadn’t noticed him  _avoiding_  them though, aside from Arthur excusing himself due to a spate of nausea and headaches, which wasn’t entirely unusual. Though, he hadn’t had them quite this bad in a while. Not since middle school.

“I’m sure he’s not avoiding you…why would he?” She wonders. Outside the car the desert flashes by. The setting sun, partially hidden behind a wispy cloud, is casting a purple glow on the cactus and other desert plants.

Lewis sighs heavily, “I don’t know, I thought I imagined it at first. He did say he was feeling sick when we were over on Saturday and Sunday. But… when we were there on Monday afternoon, he didn’t spend a second in a room with me when you weren’t there as well,”

Vivi frowns, considering Lewis’s statement. She would like to say that Arthur was just going through a bit of a rough spot and not to overthink it. Lewis cared a lot about people, meaning this sort of stuff bugged him more than it did Vivi. However, there were a few other inconsistencies that weren’t adding up. Like the fact that Arthur hadn’t patted or played with Mystery. Arthur loved animals, and he loved Mystery. He hadn’t even acknowledged Mystery when she’d brought him along during their weekend painting.

“Remember all those days he missed in middle school? I think this might be something similar,” She finally says, because it’s the most logical explanation based on what she knows about Arthur. What might have set off the behaviour though, she has no idea.

“Do you think he’s having family trouble?” She hums thoughtfully, rubbing the side of her jaw. She should ask Uncle Lance. He would know.

“Maybe he doesn’t want to come on the road trip,” Lewis comments.

“What?”

Huh? Surely, Arthur would tell them if he was uncomfortable coming on the road trip. Then again, Arthur was a naturally quiet person and liked to keep to himself, so he might not.

“I mean, I never asked him, I just assumed he was okay with it,” Lewis continues, sounding thoroughly unhappy.

“I’m sure he would tell us,” She reassures, “He did seem pretty keen on it when we were originally planning,”

When they had brought up the idea of a supernatural, cross-country tour, it had been Arthur who had set a budget, put saving goals in place, and replaced the engine in his van so it could withstand the marathon trip. Vivi was a ‘leap first ask questions never’ sort of person and Lewis tended to get swept up in the emotional/people side of things, leaving logic in the dust. Arthur was the thinker of the group. He had been the one to turn her wild pipe-dream into a reality. Surely, that was a sign that he wanted to go.

“Arthur hates scary supernatural stuff, so it makes sense. Remember that night we spent in the cemetery. He almost had a heart attack,“ Lewis vents, "Do you think he thinks I’m forcing him to come with us?”

They did sort of need his van. The only other vehicle they had access to was Lewis’s car which he shared with the rest of his family. What if Arthur was feeling pressured and painting the van had been a terrible reminder that he was about to go on a trip he didn’t want to.

“Maybe, we should actually talk to Arthur before jumping to conclusions,” Vivi deflects because they could speculate all they wanted, talk in circles for all eternity, and never have an answer. The only thing they could do to know for sure would be to go straight to the source.

Lewis shoots her a small smile, it’s looking a little more natural and genuine, and she’s relieved. Now she just needs to get to the bottom of Arthur’s problem. Then both her boys can get back to having a good time instead of angsting.

On the left, Kingsman Mechanics slides into view over the horizon.


	5. Living in the Present 1

 

_“Are you sure about this one. It says to keep out,” Arthur gestures at the several, poorly constructed, wooden signs hammered into the ground outside the gaping maw of the ridiculously creepy cave._

_“So have half the other places we’ve visited,” Vivi points out from where she’s poking about in the equally spooky tree line which rims the cave’s entrance, “We’ve never let that stop us before.”_

_“Yeah, and I remember getting chased through a forest by a bunch of machete-wielding, red-cloaked wackos. Sometimes, there’s a good reason for the keep out signs,” he calls at her, watching her disappear momentarily behind a gnarly tree._

_“I’m sure that was a one-off,” Lewis comments, walking up, putting him in line with Arthur. Mystery comes snuffling along in the grass at his feet, and he bends to give the dog a scratch behind the ears. The action calms his nerves._

_“There are no rumours of a cult this time,” Vivi pops out of a nearby bush, causing Arthur to start nervously and pull away from Mystery. She shoots him an apologetic glance._

_“Great,” Arthur mutters, rubbing his chest to calm his steadily increasing heart rate. Is it just him or is the inky back cave entrance emanating an increasingly ominous vibe? The hairs on his arm stick upright while a wave of unease sweeps up and down his limbs._

_“We’ll be fine,” Vivi reassures, approaching so she is next to Lewis, “We’ve been through a ton of caves. The worst thing that could happen? We, maybe, get swarmed by some bats.”_

_“Ah, how about a cave in?”_

_“No seismic activity in the area, I checked,” Vivi declares as she marches forward a few steps, turning to call back, “You boys coming or what,”_

_Mystery bounds off to follow Vivi, leaving him and Lewis. Arthur watches them disappear, swallowed up by the dark, and shivers._

_A comforting hand falls in his shoulder, “If this has you really worried we can always wait out here while Vivi takes her supernatural readings.”_

_Arthur sighs, very tempted to take Lewis up on the offer, “No. It’s fine. Probably best not to let Vivi go spelunking with only Mystery as back up.”_

_“Probably,” Lewis laughs, “Okay, then just sick behind me. I’m sure this will be just as boring as all the other caves we’ve walked through.”_

_Arthur cracks a smile, “Yeah. Boring…Alright, lead on then,”_

_He waits for Lewis to step forward._

_Lewis doesn’t move. Seconds tick slowly by._

_“Lewis?”_

_No response. Lewis’s hand tightens on his shoulder. Fear craws its way down Arthur’s arm from the point of contract, freezing him in place._

_“Lewis? What are you…” His sentence dies when he turns. Lewis’s hand is wreathed in bright purple flame._

_“ARTHUR!”_

_Lewis snarls, spinning him around, grabbing the front of his shirt. Flames erupt around him. Arthur is burning now, suffocating in the intense heat. Lewis’s expression is full of furious hate, matching the raging fire around them. Everything is scorching hot, scenery burning away till there is nothing but dancing shadows. The fire spreads down his left arm, eating it apart and turning it to lose ash. Arthur watches in acute horror as the ash disperses, disintegrated and consumed by the furious inferno._

_Lewis wrenches him into the air, roaring like the blaze overwhelming his form._

_“THIS IS YOUR FAULT!”_

Arthur lurches awake, fighting against the blankets and smothering heat pressing down around him.  _He’s burning!_  Half awake, he manages to fling the bedsheets off to the side, freeing his arms and legs.  _Where’s Lewis!_  His bedside lamp crashes to the floor, taking his full water glass with it. Suddenly, the air is rent by the sound of glass breaking and scattering across the floorboards. Water hits him in the face, and he flinches back almost toppling over and off the opposite side of his bed. He flings out a hand to grip the headboard, using the other to clench the loose shirt around his chest. A few seconds of breathless wheezing pass by without incident.

Quiet stillness is restored to the room. Arthur’s eyes dart around, scanning his desk and various bookshelves. Frantically, he clutches at his left shoulder, feeling for its organic warmth. He fumbles for his phone, the only object remaining atop his bedside table, switching it on. Soft artificial light illuminates his darkened room. He exhales a long breath of relief. There’s nothing out of the ordinary. The date is still 2014. His arm is fleshy, unharmed and still attached to his body. Everything is fine.

Slowly, the adrenaline pumping through his limbs fades, leaving him physically exhausted. Arthur collapses back onto his pillow to stare at the dimly lit ceiling. He brings his phone up, squinting at its bight screen. It’s four in the morning. Arthur runs a hand down his face, rubbing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose. Now his heart isn’t trying to beat its way out of his chest he’s feeling oddly twitchy and jittery. What was that? Three hours sleep? Better than nothing, but not great.

He exhales again and turns his head to the side to peer at his window. The small piece of horizon visible through the frame is turning a faint pastel blue, silhouetting the desert, making it an inky blob against the sky. There’s no way he’s getting back to sleep now. Not after  _that_. No matter what he anticipates, the nightmares catch him off guard every single time. His brain coming up with increasingly creative and shitty scenarios for him to live through.

With a long yawn, Arthur sits upright, glancing over the side of his bed at the floor covered in glass shards. The lamp appears to have survived its impact with the ground, and Arthur hoists it up, flicking it on so he can navigate without cutting himself. Sluggishly, he manages to collect all the shards together in a pile, ready to be swept into a dustpan. One of the only upsides to having a metal arm had been the ability to pick up dangerous stuff without worrying. Not much of an upside but it was- or had been- better than nothing

Another yawn. Arthur misses his old tools. It’s times like right now that he would be tinkering with his arm or some other device. Now he’s got several hours of waiting before he can go down to the workshop. With little to do, he sits at his desk, glaring blearily at his computer screen, idly scanning the web and re-familiarising himself with all the technical and limb-related scientific advances of his current time. It’s a relaxing habit.

An ache of general fatigue settles around his shoulders like an unwelcome houseguest. He’s going to need to do something about this Lewis Situation. A few more nights like this and he’ll be well on his way to recapturing the magic of his older body. What he’s currently doing, which is nothing and hoping that it’ll miraculously get better by itself, isn’t working.

Arthur stands abruptly and sways over to his book shelves, pulling down an old box from the top and getting a mouthful of dust for his trouble. In it are his old anxiety meds which, at this point in time, he hasn’t used since high school. He shakes the bottle. It is either empty or the tablets have melted to the bottom, making them unusable. He sighs in disappointment.  A new prescription is probably in his best interests, as much as he wishes it weren’t.

Moodily, he moves to stand in front of the window, careful to navigate the pile of glass and the corner of his desk. He can’t go to the local doctor. One, because there was a 50% chance that the doctor he’d be seeing would be Vivi’s dad, and two, he doesn’t want the whole town knowing he’s back on anxiety medication. Which means he needs to go to the slightly larger- but not that large-town an hour and a bit drive away. While he’s at it, he can pick up sleeping aids and some tinkering equipment.

Since waking up in this time, he’s been in the workshop pretty sporadically, playing up a spate of migraines and nausea to dodge his Uncle’s increasingly pointed comments. It’s been a balancing act of pretending to be sick and the needing something to do to keep himself distracted. If he stays cooped up in his room ‘resting’ for too long his mind turns into a trap, dragging him from one painful experience to the next until he’s caught in a horrible loop.  Equipment or a project to work on would help with that.

On the horizon, a lighter yellow peeks over the dry landscape.

It’s around five thirty heading to six. His Uncle usually started his day between six and seven. Lance would probably buy the excuse that he needed a day off, though he might find it strange. Either way, he wasn’t going to ask permission, just leave a note on the kitchen counter. Far easier than trying to explain stuff. If he left now, he would arrive in the neighbouring town at six or seven give or take, meaning he would only have to wait about an hour for a majority of the shops to be open.  

Decision made and with a new goal in place, Arthur quickly throws on some clothes, tiptoeing across the landing and down the stairs past Lance’s room. A few minutes later and he’s pulling onto the main road.

.  .  .

Arthur steps out of the office building’s foyer and is immediately accosted by the uncomfortably bright sunlight. He winces, shading his eyes, taking a moment to adjust and shake off the usual full-body jitters skittering along his limbs and torso. The air is hot, dry, and itchy. After being blasted with the cold air-conditioning for almost three hours, it’s especially jarring. He takes a breath and lets the tension go, feeling a whole lot lighter now the hard part of the trip is done and dusted. All it took was a few hours of anxious waiting,-pretty standard considering he had rocked up without an appointment,-and he now has his new prescription and a referral to the specialist he actually wants to see. It had taken him a ridiculously long time to find this woman the first time around, what with having to cycle through an extensive line-up of medical professionals, and he’s glad he can skip the drama this time. Though, he’s not sure how he’s going to manage appointments when he’s road tripping across the country with Vivi and Lewis.

Arthur frowns down at the referral paper, continuing down the steps to the footpath running adjacent to the building. There’s no way he is letting Lewis and Vivi go on a supernatural road trip without him. Not with them being entirely in the dark about how dangerous the whole thing could be. Sure, they had Mystery, but he is beginning to suspect that Mystery didn’t care much for anyone who wasn’t Vivi (and he’s not even sure he can trust that anymore). He would just have to manage alone until they returned.  _If they returned._  Arthur forcefully shoves the paper down into the front pocket of his shoulder bag, trying not to think too hard on a topic bound to bring his mood lower than it already was.

As he turns to head back to his van, his gaze travels automatically across the plaza filled with shoppers, past the line of diners and restaurants, to land on the looming grey, brick, cube-like structure of St Peter’s Medical and Emergency Centre. It’s the largest building in the block aside from the few office buildings behind it, and even those weren’t very high, causing it to lean almost threateningly over the shorter boutiquey outlets in the street just before it. Dry wind ruffles his hair pulling him its direction, and his steps falter. He stares at the structure wearily. Funnily, in this life, he’s never actually stepped foot in the Emergency Centre.

So entranced is he by the odd sense of dislocation that he walks straight into a thin woman pushing an overladen trolley.

“Hey, watch where you’re going,” She snaps, pausing to glare, while he’s busy ricocheting backward and stumbling in his attempt to keep his feet.

“Ah,” Arthur yanks his attention away from the hospital and tries for an apologetic tone, “Sorry?”  It’s not like the woman’s been affected by his mishap. Arthur is the one with sore shins. The lady huffs and continues on, a cloud of irritation following her down the path.

The small commotion has drawn the attention of several strangers who have all turned to give him a brief glance before getting on with their day. Now feeling overexposed and increasingly off balance, Arthur power walks around the building to the parking lot and the safety of his van. The back of his neck is prickling uncomfortably, and there is a disconcerting, foreboding taint, hanging about his shoulders right up until he slams and locks his van door. He takes a deep breath and rests his head against the steering wheel. Then runs a hand through his hair, twisting a strand between two fingers.

Now that’s over with he should focus on the more enjoyable parts of his trip. Mainly, finding equipment and collecting some components to mess around with during those long hours spent alone in his room avoiding people. It’s a good thing he knows exactly where to go. Future knowledge: great for saving friends from certain disaster and navigating unfamiliar towns. He turns the key and pulls out.

A brief wave of melancholic nostalgia has him taking an additional turn around the block, passing several familiar shops. Tomb Tome, a frequent haunt of his high school years and Future Vivi’s old place of employment. He slows so he can stare at the shopfront, which is plastered with familiar colourful posters, pamphlets and info on local gaming and comic events, obscuring most of the shop’s windows. Vivi probably would have enjoyed it there a lot more if not for the circumstanced of their temporary move. It’s weird to think that she might never work there in this timeline. Not if his plans to change the future are successful. He speeds up, facing forward, massaging his left thumb into the steering wheel. The second-hand tech shop is a few streets down, and he pushes forwards, banishing the odd sense of disappointment.

Headphones and some slow music wash out the world until it’s just him and shelves of old computers, spare parts, and various mechanical and technical equipment. Slowly, the last few days of stress and anxiety drain away. He buys a whole lot more than he means to, which, on top of the doctor’s visit, takes a significant bite out of his personal saving. It doesn’t bother him as much as it might.

It’s towards the end of his shopping trip, or as Lewis would call it his ‘retail therapy,’ that the nagging feeling of apprehension, which he’d been trying to ignore since the running into the woman outside the doctor’s office, comes to bite him on the ass.

He’s back at his van, shuffling around with his overstuffed shopping bags when a shout, loud enough to penetrate through his music, catches his attention.

“Hey!”

Arthur pulls the buds from his ears, glancing over his shoulder to watch a heavy-set man, with an impressive beard and a leather vest, stomp towards him. There is something familiar and disconcerting about him.

“Hey, you! Kid!” The strange man yells again in a gravely southern accent. Arthur glances around, but he’s the only person out in the street. He watches the stranger approach, trepidation beginning to coil in his gut.

“You’re the kid from the diner, the one that made the suggestion about my bike’s engine.”

Oh. It clicks. This is the famed Leather Guy. It’s been almost two years, but Arthur still recognises the perpetually scowly face of a man never more than a few wrong words away from a fist fight.

“Err, yeah?” He answers slowly, hesitating.  

“Name’s Micky,” Newly named Micky introduces, coming to a stop a few paces from Arthur.

“Sorry about taking a swing at you kid. Had a rough day. Went in to apologise but only saw your big purple friend,”

Arthur begins sorting through his key ring as subtly as possible, answering, “No problem. I could probably have been a bit more polite when pointing it out,”

He knows not to judge people based on appearance alone, but this guy’s looking awfully intimidating. His heart rate is increasing, and he can already feel the subtle flush of adrenalin, wiring him up in case he needs to move fast.  

“Hey now, no need to be modest, kid. Not when you know your stuff. It’s good I ran into you because I’ve been needing a second opinion on my bike.”

Micky shoves a hand into his jacket pocket and takes another step forward. A step too many in Arthur’s opinion.

“The mechanic I took it too was as clueless as a dim bulb if you catch my meaning.”

“Hehe, where’d you go? Donald and Son’s Repairs?” He laughs half-heartedly. Donald and Son’s is only other mechanic within several miles of the Pepper’s diner.

“Yeah, actually, went there and they did a piss-poor job. If you could take a look at it, I’d feel a load better. Have a long trip coming, you see. Can’t have my baby breaking down in the middle of nothing now.”

Why does he get the feeling that Micky has never been to Donald and Son’s and that his bike is fine? Arthur, trying to keep his body language as light as possible, locates his key. He has learnt from many a bad experience to trust his instincts. Right now they’re telling him to get out of dodge.

“Actually, I’m kind of in a rush at the moment,”

It’s not even a lie. He needs to start heading home soon if he wants to beat Lewis and Vivi who would be coming over after Vivi’s shift ended at five.

“But I work at Kingsman Mechanics …you can bring your bike there if you want it fixed,” he suggests, inserting his key into the door, preparing to make a break for it.

Something clicks, and it’s not the sound of his van being unlocked.

“Yeah, I don’t think so, kid. How about you step back from the van,”

Between looking down at the door and his key, Micky has pulled a gun, pointing it in his direction. Arthur freezes. Micky’s holding it casually so, to anyone looking, it wouldn’t be immediately apparent.

“Come on, then. Promise this’ll only be for a few seconds,” Micky says gruffly, seemingly irritated that Arthur hadn’t just followed him to straight into a back alley like a chump.

“Ah,” Arthur’s replies intelligently while his brain spins its wheels, attempting process this sudden change in circumstance.

He stares at the gun then up at Micky.

“Okay?” He offers when nothing better comes to mind.

It’s not the first time he’s had a gun pointed at him. When he had been road tripping with Lewis and Vivi he always seemed to be the one getting held up and chased by the wackos behind whatever ‘haunting’ they investigated. Remain calm. Don’t panic. Don’t antagonise. It’s the same sort of process.

Surprisingly, it’s not nearly as panic-inducing as those previous times. Instead of the fear bulldozing over logical thought, it’s just keeping him nicely tense and ready. How is that fair? Point a gun in his face and he’s not even flinching, but put him in a room with Lewis and he can barely function without throwing up the contents of his stomach. Just add it to the list of failures.


	6. Living in the Present 2

Micky gestures to the narrow street, running down the side of the shop he’s just spent almost an hour in. Arthur glances around, but there is still no one in the immediate vicinity.

“You can drop the bags kid,” Micky comments when Arthur begins to shuffle, shopping bags and all, in the direction indicated.

Arthur thinks about following the instruction for about two seconds before asking, “Can I hold onto them?”

Sure, it would free up his arms, but he had just spent a whole day and several hundred dollars tracking this stuff down, he’s not about to leave it on the ground where any random person could grab it.

Micky gives him an odd look, and shrugs, “Whatever,”

“Thanks,” Arthur mutters, realising after the fact how odd it is to be thanking the guy holding him a gunpoint. Micky apparently thinks so too, raising a brow. In his defence, this is the most recent shitty thing to happen in a long line of shitty things. It’s not even in his top ten. Not currently. He hopes that’s not about to change. The Arthur rubber band is stretched pretty thin by this point.

Thus, Arthur ends up lugging an armload of shopping bags around the back of the darkening building, lamenting his innate ability to attract crazy people because he doesn’t think this has anything to do with something ordinary like being robbed.

It is pretty gloomy in the one-lane street, and he almost doesn’t spot the second man propped against one of the walls next to two hefty muscle bikes, who he recognises from his brief spat at the Pepper’s diner. There is no Lewis to bail him out this time. Shorter and heavier than his counterpart, with the red scrawly hair, the second man glares at the both of them when they come around the corner.

“Micky,” He snaps, voice deep and gravely, matching his angry scowl, “What the hell are you doing?”

“What!” Micky retorts, “It’s the best way to get results.”

Harsh words are exchanged, growing in volume, and Arthur shuffles back a step to give himself breathing room in case the two angry men decide to open fire. This whole scenario is an unknown, different from his first time around. It’s making him increasingly nervous. He doesn’t want to die here, not when he has things to change. Though, if he does end up murdered in a back alley, it would probably put a stop to Vivi and Lewis’s supernatural road trip.

“All you needed to do was ask a few questions and explain what’s happenin. Not traumatise him,” Leather guy number two lectures.

Arthur coughs, shuffling his bags around so they can rest on the ground. His arms are getting tired.

“Does he look traumatised to you?” Micky retorts, waving the gun in Arthur’s direction. Both sets of eyes settle of him, expressions narrowing in suspicion. Though the second man is glaring, Arthur’s not getting the same vibe shouting DANGER, it’s almost welcoming in comparison to Micky’s aura of violence.

“My names Dan, who’ve already met Micky here,” Dan turns toward him, stepping in close, holding out a dusty hand to shake.  There is an expectant pause. Arthur stares at the limb. He’s not sure how he feels about shaking hands, not after he just got his left one back and whole again.

The expectant silence stretches awkwardly. Arthur extends his arm slowly.

“Arthur, was it?” Dan asks. Great, they knew his name.

“Yeah?”

He tries to contain the flinch when their hands connect and is partially successful. Dan doesn’t seem to notice. His grip is vice-like, and he gives his arm a firm shake, frowning like Arthur is a confusing puzzle.

“Apologies for all this,” a gesture at Micky and the gun, “My brother’s an idiot,”

Micky scoffs but steps back to lean against a wall, lowing his gun to keep a watch on the street’s entrance.

“You’re probably wondering what this is about.”

“A little,” Arthur answers honestly. Now the gun is not pointed right at him he can re-centre and logically work through what’s happening. The constant chill of threat is still hanging around, but it’s not entirely overwhelming.

Dan nods and continues, “Now, this might sound strange so keep an open mind, but we’re like investigators, you see, except we look into strange and unusual occurrences. As it happens, your town has an unusually high…” Dan pauses to think, “let’s call it an otherworldly presence, about it. If you could tell us anything about the place, we’d be grateful.”

The only supernatural entity in the area he knows of is Mystery and, as apprehensive as he is about the dog, he’s not about to sic two guys with guns on him. Not to mention, he’s pretty sure Mystery would wipe the floor with any regular human. Guns or not.  Also, you don’t just hold someone hostage to ask whether their town it haunted or whatever without some ulterior motive. He’s not an idiot.

“So does that make you supernatural detectives or something?” He asks both for clarification and to stall while he figures out what exactly is going on.

“Yeah, in a nutshell, sure,” Dan considered him, crossing his arms and stepping back, “You’re taking all this awful well for someone who’s supposedly new to it,”

Arthur raises his hands in what he hopes is a placating gesture, “Ah, my friend, Vivi, she’s super into that sort of thing. We’ve been in a few weirder than usual scapes as a result,” he laughs as naturally as possible, “I’ve never believed it much myself,”

At least he’s finding it easier lying to these guys than he did with Vivi and Lewis. All that practise has to pay off at some point, even when it’s not exactly where he wants it to.  

Micky, apparently, has had enough with the stalling because he pushes aggressively off the wall, “Cut the crap kid. We saw you last week. No one builds a spiritual pressure that fast without extra help,”

The gun is back and in his face.

Arthur holds his hands a little higher, and can’t help but ask, “Spiritual pressure?”

“Don’t play dumb. You’ve got double what a human should have. What was it? Messing around with the occult? You some sort of shifter.”  

“I really have no idea what you’re talking about,”

“Calm down Mick,” Dan waves a hand to calm his brother, dropping into a more serious tone, “Look, Arthur, he’s how this is going to go. We’re going to run a few tests. See if we can get anything off you. If there’s nothing, then you’ll be free to go.”

While Micky glares, now silent, Dan pulls out a pack of chalk. He gestures Arthur forward and begins to sketch out a circle on the grimy concrete around his feet. He recognises a few of the symbols. After The Cave and getting his arm removed Arthur had paid a lot more attention to the library’s worth of supernatural books Vivi owned. This is infinitely more complex than any of the stuff he’d read. Was this whole situation a result of time travel? He can’t see how the two would be related, but nothing else of significance has happened within the last week which could have caused the change in…. spiritual pressure? Of course, he’s not about to try and explain that.

Several meters away he can hear a roller door shutting as shops close for the evening. The whole area is darkening, throwing long shadows across the cement and asphalt. There is no way he’s beating Vivi and Lewis home now.

“So, it’s just the two of you, doing this investigating supernatural stuff,” Arthur breaks the silence, the need for answers outweighing his apprehension.

“Yeah, just us for the moment. It’s more of a side job,”

“Have you been doing it long?”

“Long enough to know a few things.”

Slowly, it begins to dawn on him, - now that’s he not in immediate danger, -that this may be the perfect chance to do something about The Cave. This was his chance to act before Vivi and Lewis even got near the thing. If Micky and Dan were any good, then maybe this was a blessing in disguise.

“Hmm,” Dan hums after what feels like several hours of sketching, stepping back to contemplate Arthur and the circle.

“What?”

“You seem human enough, congratulations.”

Arthur breaths in relief. There was a small part of him which had worried that he had been changed fundamentally by the time travel.  It’s nice to have some positive confirmation that he’s somewhat normal.

“Serious?” Micky grumbles, finally shoving his gun back into his pocket, “A whole day wasted for a false alarm.”

Dan shrugs loosely, addressing Arthur appearing more perplexed now, “True to word. You’re free to go. Sorry for the drama but we have to be sure about this stuff,”

He packs away his chalk, moving a foot out to smudge the intricate lines decorating the ground. Arthur takes a step back to watch, hesitating.

“You heard what he said. Get out of here kid,” Micky orders, lighting a cigarette, still muttering obscenities under his breath.

“You know how I said my friend was into this sort of stuff,” he starts and pauses.

Dan glanced across at him, “What about it?”

“A few days back we went on a day trip to check out this cave. Err, nothing really happened, but there were a lot of warnings about the place being cursed,” That’s what Mystery had told him the few times he had worked up the nerve to ask about The Cave. Some sort of evil curse which had latched onto Arthur and could only be removed via amputation, “Maybe something happened there?”

“Never heard of a curse that increases spiritual pressure,” Dan frowns, staring with dark scrutinising eyes.

Arthur shrugs, “It’s the only thing I’ve done differently in the past week,”

“Can’t hurt to take a look I guess. Where’s this cave located?”

Because it would seem weird to rattle off the location of a place he had supposedly only been to once, Arthur fishes around for his phone. Dan leans in to copy the address, commenting, “I’d keep these supernatural trips to a minimum if I were you. Most of this stuff’s harmless, but there’s always a few nasties waiting in the shadows.”

Preaching to the choir there.

“and keep an eye out for anything strange. Spiritual pressure is a lot like a beacon of sorts. Some say it’s linked in with the soul, not that there’s ever been proof of that except for the fact that a lot of those nasties are drawn to it. Your town seems safe enough, we did a whole sweep and didn’t get much in the way of recent malevolent activity, but it’s always best to be careful. Especially, when you’ve got more of it than normal…”

Dan finishes and gives him a stern expression.

“Thanks for the warning. I’ll keep a lookout,” Arthur offers to which Dan nods. Now there’s no undercurrent of malice Dan kind of reminds him of his Uncle.  

“You see anything weird give this number a call.”

A business card, which is mostly blank save for a number, is thrust into his hand. As much as he would like to stay and ask a dozen more questions its already dark and Vivi and Lewis were probably freaking out about his absence. He shuffles back over to his shopping bags, hulling them up. Neither Micky or Dan say much else, though they both watch him make his hurried exit.


	7. Living in the Present (Lewis)

“Maybe, we should actually talk to Arthur before jumping to conclusions,” Vivi comments after a few beats of silence. Maybe Lewis is overthinking, just a bit. An occasional odd glance here and there did not necessarily mean Arthur was mad at him. And his twitchiness could be chalked up to a few particularly bad nights of sleep.

With his focus on the highway stretching up ahead he can’t see Vivi’s expression, but her tone is one part reassuring and two parts worry. There is also steel and conviction, signalling her renewed dedication to get to the bottom of this problem with nothing, not even the universe itself, stopping her. He offers Vivi a smaller smile, hoping to alleviate any concern directed his way. Now Vivi can concentrate all her efforts and determination on Arthur instead of splitting focus between the two of them.

Kingsman Mechanics appears on the horizon, and Lewis slows, preparing to turn. Gravel crunches under tiers and the car vibrates, protesting the change in terrain. There are a few foreign vehicles parked out front, probably clients, but Arthur’s van isn’t among them. They’d taken to leaving it parked around the back, so he doesn’t think too hard on the observation. Lewis swings in next to a newer-looking car which had probably been pretty shiny before it had been coated in dust and sand.

He parks, Vivi jumps out, and he takes a second to pull himself out of the cramped space, stretching. The one thing he likes about Arthur’s van is the abundance of legroom it provided someone of his stature. Wind buffets him about, pulling at his hair and clothes. Dust and dirt is being tossed across the driveway, forcing him to shield his eyes.

Vivi approaches, hiding a grin behind a raised hand, so his hair must be doing something funny. Nice to know somebody enjoys the ongoing battle between his hair and the forces of nature.

“You have a little something in your eye there Lew,” Vivi sniggers, reaching up to flip his hair to the side, so it’s not completely covering his eyes. He bends to give her better access.

“Really, I hadn’t noticed,” He deadpans.

“I hope you bought that special comb with you,” Vivi continues when another, stronger, gust forces hair into both their eyes. Why he’s the one always copping a teasing for spending time on his hair is a mystery, considering Arthur put almost the same amount of effort into his.

“Let’s just get inside,” He answers, amused, adding, “and, for the record, I never go anywhere without that comb,”

Vivi laughs, grabbing his arm to pull him onward, “Righto, time to go sort out our Arthur dilemma,”

He nods, allowing Vivi to tug him forward. The building is quiet, lights in the reception switched off, the garage closed for the day. A strong wind kicks up more dirt in their wake, forcing them to wedge into the sheltered doorway. Vivi raises a fist to pound on the heavy wooden door as hard as she can. It rattles in its frame.

“Hello! Arthur!” She yells, unabashed. It’s not uncommon for Arthur to be up in his room, listening to music, dead to the world, and miss their arrival completely.

Vivi pauses between her pounding to listen for footsteps, ear pressed against the door.

“ARTHUR! WHY DON’T YOU HAVE A DOORBELL THAT WORKS!” She shouts.

“Do you think we should go throw rocks at his window again?” Vivi turns towards him, hands on her hips, “This is always so much harder when the garage is closed, and we can’t just walk around.”

“Let’s put a pin in that one for later,” He placates, smothering a smile. Lance would not think any better of them if they put another crack in Arthur’s window.

Luckily, no sooner have the words left in his mouth, the door clicks, and there is the sound of a bolt being moved. A  loud squeak of almost rusted hinges and the door is pulled open. The short, grumpy figure of Lance appears, eyebrows creased, arms crossed, apparently unimpressed by Vivi’s banging.  

“Heya! Uncle Lance,” Vivi begins, putting on an extra layer of enthusiasm, “Is Arthur in his room? I keep telling him not to wear headphones when he’s expecting people.”

Lance gives a funny expression, eye’s scanning the two of them, setting back on Vivi. Several expressions, maybe a mix between surprise and concern, flash by before Lewis can get a good lock on them. Lance has always been a tricky person to read but he can tell something is bothering the man. He’s not sure if its Vivi’s zeal, his usual grouchiness or something else.

Lewis moves closer to Vivi, so their sides are touching, commenting, “I’m guessing Arthur didn’t tell you we were coming.”

“I’ll say,” Lance grumbles, snorting, “He’s been out since before I woke. Wrote a note sayin he’s doin a supply run. I thought he’d be goin with you lot, but I see I’m mistakin,”

They’d agreed to leave all the supply shopping for the last Saturday before their road trip to prevent them forgetting anything, and because it’s always more fun to shop together.

“Ah…what?” Vivi voices his confusion. Arthur must be shopping for something else. Either that or he’d decided to do it all by himself as a way to avoid Lewis. Lewis can’t help the grimace from creeping over his features.

Lance glances between them, probably noting their surprise, and releases a long breath, “Come in then. I suppose I should offer the two of you a drink for comin out even when my nephew isn’t around to keep his appointments.” Lance’s frown fluctuates between disapproval and concern.

All that subconscious worry for Arthur’s wellbeing returns with a vengeance, coiling uncomfortably in his stomach. Sure, Arthur is forgetful, but not quite this forgetful, not when they’d sent him several reminders about their impending visit. Also, there’s been other odd instances of Arthur forgetting as well. He hadn’t logged into any of his online accounts in the last week. Usually, Lewis wasn’t a huge gamer, but he did like playing with Arthur who always had something witty to say about on whatever game they decided to play. Arthur had missed their usual times both yesterday and the day before, and it was another in a growing list of strange behaviours. Or perhaps, it’s not forgetfulness at all and Arthur is, in fact, going out of his way to avoid Lewis.

“Did he say when he’d be back?” Vivi asks, tugging him inside, and Lewis shakes the negative line of thinking away. Vivi’s known Arthur a lot longer than him so he should trust her judgment and not jump to conclusions.

“Just said he’d be gone for the day,” Lance moves with them, waving them along begrudgingly. Lewis turns to make sure the door closes firmly behind them. He knows from first-hand experience how annoying it to try and clean a whole lot of dust off the floor.

“Nothing else?” Vivi presses, walking ahead, following on the shorter man’s heels, crossing into the living area. 

“Here you can take a look at the note yourself,” Lance picks up a piece of paper, handing it to Vivi before shuffling to the fridge. Lewis walks up behind Vivi and leans down so he can read over her shoulder. It really is just one line saying Arthur would be taking a day off and for Lance not to worry.

Vivi is frowning now, both at the paper and more generally into the middle-distance, Lewis can see her mind working through possible scenarios. She looks at him, and he shrugs. It’s not that Arthur can’t go shopping, just that this, coupled with his most recent behaviour, makes it strange.

“Beer?” Lance interrupts their silent dialogue, holding out a can to Lewis.

“I’m driving back, so not tonight. I’ll just have tap water.”

“Can I have tea?” Vivi asks when Lance turns to her, receiving a perplexed squint in response.

“Don’t worry about making it,” Vivi adds hastily, “I know where everything is.”

“Sure,” Lance shrugs, popping open the can, “go for it.”

Vivi begins to shuffle through the kitchen, pulling out the teabags Arthur kept there just for her. She ends up fetching a glass for him as well, though he had really only responded to be polite.

“Umm, so, Uncle Lance,” Vivi starts while she fills a kettle and pushes his water across the bench towards him, “I was wondering, because Arthur’s been really withdrawn recently, if you’ve been having any, uh, family related trouble maybe?”  

Lewis would have pinched his nose in exasperation if he could. Blunt and right to the point. Classic Vivi.

Lance, apparently caught somewhat off guard, gives her a hard look, “I haven’t heard one peek out'ta the bastard in years, and I made sure he doesn’t have Arthur’s number, so there’s no way for him to get in contact shy of physically drivin out.”

Vivi pauses in her tea making, teabag suspended above a cup of hot water, “Would he?”

“Not if he knows what’s good from him,” Lance snaps, anger colouring his tone. He takes an aggressive gulp of beer.

“Oh, okay,” Vivi responds, leaning back, shooting him a look which screams, ‘feel free to jump in anytime.’ Vivi’s blunt mannerisms, while cutting right to the heart of matters, tended to discourage conversation.

“Sorry if this is a bit forward,” He starts, “We’re just worried because, the last few times we’ve been over, he’s been very quiet. Quieter than usual,”

Lance grumbles under his breath, seeming very tired. Whether it’s caused by Vivi’s sudden, and slightly inappropriate, line of questioning or concern for Arthur is unclear.

“Arthur’s always been stubborn about keeping his problems to himself, runs in the family, so he hasn’t said anything to me. But I can tell you that he _has_ been out of sorts for the last week. Says it’s headaches and nausea, but I’ve been around long enough to know there’s something more to it. ”

“And there’s nothing you can think of that’s been different lately,” Vivi jumps back in.

“Apart from you lot paintin that van, the boy’s barely left his room. Maybe you’ll have better luck talkin with him than me.”

Lewis catches Vivi’s eye, and he tries for a meaningful glance. She responds with a flick of the head which could mean, ‘let’s talk outside,’ or a, ‘don’t worry I’ve got this,.’

Lance spends a few seconds watching them attempt to silently communicate before he chucks his empty beer can in the trash, cracking his back, “You’re welcome to stay until Arthur returns, whenever that may be. I’ll be workin in the garage so call if ya need anythin.”

“Thanks,” Lewis responds quickly before Vivi can start her grilling again, “We know our way around so don’t worry about us.”

Lance nods, tripping his head in Lewis’s direction, before ambling towards the door.

“So…it’s not family trouble…that we know off,” Vivi starts the moment Lance is out of earshot, keeping her voice low. They know from experience that the walls are pretty thin here.

“Unless they’ve been secretly contacting him without Lance’s knowledge,”

He can tell she’s sceptical even as she speaks.

“And if it really is about the road trip?” He once again voices his apprehension, leaving out the part where he’s almost sure that  _he_  is the reason why Arthur doesn’t want to go.

“Then he just needs to come out and say it,” Vivi frowns, picking at a napkin, covering the bench in white confetti, “This doesn’t have to be a supernatural-themed road trip. It can be a boring, regular, touristy road trip,”

“Maybe he just doesn’t want to disappoint us. You haven’t exactly been subtle about how excited you are.”

Vivi huffs, saying with a renewed conviction, “Yeah, sure, I would be a little disappointed… but if Arthur doesn’t want to see scary, supernatural things then we don’t see scary, supernatural things. Problem solved.”

They fall silent, listening to the crunch of gravel as a vehicle pulls into the driveway out fount. Vivi perks up from where she’s leaning against the counter sipping her tea, twisting in the direction of the door. Before he can get a word in, she has rushed off. Lewis hesitates, rising stiffly then sitting back down to wait.


	8. Living in the Present 3

 

The streetlights, marking the start of the highway, flicker on when Arthur turns past, signalling the start of sunset. He pushes the van as close to the speed limit as he can without exceeding it. Lewis running him off the road with his freaky ghost truck has curbed any inclination to drive faster than needed. Nothing like a trip through your own windshield to squash reckless behaviour. He is already going to miss Lewis and Vivi’s arrival by about forty minutes, what’s another ten on top of that?

Arthur yawns, rubbing an eye, watching the scenery flash by in a blur with the other. Three hours sleep, a day full of activity, and getting held at gunpoint would make anyone exhausted. At least he’s not dead. That’s something. But, who knows, maybe he’d wake up back in his room like the last time, and he’d get to live the whole week all over again. He still has no idea how this time travel thing works, only that it apparently had ‘doubled his spiritual pressure’ whatever that meant. Though, if random supernatural detectives could pick out this sort of stuff, then Mystery probably could as well. Whether Mystery was going to act on the observation remained to be seen.

For now, he has one last encounter with Lewis between him and, hopefully, a full night’s sleep. At this time point in his timeline, he hasn’t built up a tolerance to sleeping medication, so he’s looking forward to it. Just bullshit his way through one meeting with Lewis and Vivi, send them home, then he can regroup and tackle the next week with a clearer head. Another yawn. Arthur drums his fingers along the steering wheel, enjoying the organic patter and absence of any metallic clinking. It’s weird, he never noticed how much clanking, clicking, and whirring his arm did until it was gone.

The last of the sunlight disappears as he turns off the highway. The sign for Kingsman Mechanics glows, piercing the darkening desert around the shop. Immediately, he picks out Lewis’s beat up hatchback squashed between the electrical hybrid and a larger station wagon. He pulls into the lot, glancing over at the garage, noting that the reception lights are still on.

Instead of relief, tension rushes right back into his limbs. After a day packed full of adrenaline, he’s surprised there’s still any left to spare. Unfortunately, that’s not how biology works, and the whole body jitters are back. He drums his fingers against the steering wheel at a more agitated pace.  With repeated exposure, he’s gotten better at withstanding Lewis’s presence. Vivi’s company definitely helps, smoothing over the worst of his irrational fear and keeping Lewis’s attention from focusing directly on him for too long. It’s just this small period before meeting which is the worst. His mind conjuring up a parade of worst-case scenarios for him to work through.  

_Fire rages, consuming his torso, Lewis holds him out, suspended in empty black space, “THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!”_

Arthur exhales miserably, killing the engine and letting his forehead thump against the steering wheel. Give him Micky and Dan over this emotional minefield any day of the week.

Across the parking lot, the reception’s door is thrown open with enough force that he hears it crack against the doorframe even from inside his van.  Vivi, briefly outlined by warm artificial light, spots his van and makes a beeline in its direction. Wind buffets her around, but she’s undeterred. Here goes nothing.

Arthur forces his limbs into motion, leaning back to collect his bags from behind the front seat before shoving the side door open.

“Arthur!” Vivi calls and waves in greeting, powerwalking up.

“Hey,” He answers casually, shoving the van door closed with an elbow, arms now full. No Mystery this time, seeing as Vivi came straight from work. There is also no sign of Lewis. Yet.

“Where have you been? We’ve been waiting for,” she checks her watch, “almost an hour now.”

“Sorry, I went shopping and time kind of got away from me,”

Vivi reaches out expectantly, and he hands her one of the bags he’s lugging. The lightest one.

“You should have texted, we were worried,” Vivi scolds, peering at him with open concern.

“By the time I realised how late it was, I was almost home…” He deflects and adds another, “Sorry” for good measure.

“Well, you still should have texted us,” Vivi’s got a look about her, broadcasting her displeasure about the whole situation. She stares at him like he’s said something odd. He probably has. There are a lot of small differences between him and his younger self which he’s stumbled over in the last week.

Lewis glances between Arthur and Vivi when they make it back inside into the living room space. He is sitting at the kitchen bench, elbow resting on the counter, slouched against his palm. Arthur hesitates for maybe a second to allow Vivi to walk first. Apparently, this micromovement is the wrong move because now Lewis has a furrowed brow and a dissecting gaze. It is only thanks to the last weeks’ worth of ‘Lewis exposure’ that he manages to push past his initial ‘panic’ response and settle into a more natural hunch.

“Hey Lewis,” He greets, forcing warmth into his tone, it’s hard because all he really wants to do is be alone and unwind,  “Sorry for making you wait. I kind of lost track of time.”

Lewis, still studying him, straightens, responding “Don’t worry about it,” glancing away towards Vivi who is trying to make a subtle hand motion off to the side. She stops when Arthur’s attention shifts. The tension in the room has ramped up, causing his chest to clench uncomfortably.

“Where did you go?” Lewis asks, switching focus. Arthur dodges the other’s searching gaze, focusing down on his purchases.

“Shopping. Needed some mechanical parts which weren’t available in town.”

“Mechanical parts? What are you making?” This time there is interest present in Lewis’s voice alongside a genuine thoughtfulness as he examines the bags with more enthusiasm.

“Uh, I’ve been thinking of going into prosthetics. Like limbs and stuff,” Arthur explains, deciding now is a good time to dump his bags. Vivi mirrors him, placing her load down a bit more gently.

“Right,” Lewis glances back up, confused, “That’s new?”

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Have a few ideas,” he chuckles, maintaining an even tone. If only they knew.

Vivi and Lewis are now staring intently at each other, making faces, doing their ‘silent communication’ routine. Only, there are a lot of stares being thrown his way as well. He skirts the couch, bench and Lewis, making for the kitchen cupboard intent on crafting his usual extra strength coffee, just for something to forces on that’s not Lewis and his own growing discomfort. He hesitates mid-motion. If he wants to sleep tonight, he definitely shouldn’t be drinking caffeine. Instead, he reaches for the herbal tea which is in range already out on the counter.

“Is this why you’ve been spending more time in your room?” Vivi breaks, following hot on his heels to the floor tiles which divide the kitchen and Livingroom’s spaces.  

“…sort of,” He says slowly, focused on the tea, successfully avoiding eye contact by facing this kettle. The soft rumble of water boiling reminds him uncomfortably of an approaching storm, and it’s not helping with the atmosphere.

“You know we’re always interested  in your projects…right?”

“Yeah?”

“Well…normally, you don’t work alone on these things, and we’ve been planning a group shop for ages.”

He coughs. Whoops. He had completely forgotten about that.

“We would have come with you…shopping…I mean,” Vivi elaborates after a frustrated silence. Because he can’t stay gawking at his cup of hot water and tea bag forever without it seaming suspicions, he finally turns. Vivi has positioned herself right behind him, leaning forward, so their faces are pretty close, separated by an inch in height difference. She’s got her arms crossed and a ‘no more bullshit’ expression on her face.  He freezes under her scrutinising stare.

“Arthur,” she starts firmly, “You’ve been acting odd all week. Is something wrong?”

He notes her mixed concern and determination, realising that this is about more than just being a bit late home from shopping. A fat lot of good comprehending this now is going to do him. Arthur curses his tired brain. Vivi’s gone full ‘intervention mode,’ and there was no stopping her when she gets like this. He must have messed up pretty badly in his attempts to recapture younger Arthur for her to be this worried.

“I’m fine…really. I’ve just been a bit nauseous and needed a bit of time to rest,” He defaults, already knowing the ship has sailed.

“Yeah, we get that,” Vivi exhales, “But, the last time you were like this wasn’t a great time for anyone. We’re just a little worried, and Uncle Lance is worried as well. Please.”

She retreats, giving him a bit more space, motioning impatiently for him to sit at the bench between her and Lewis. Legs locked momentarily in place, he’s stuck staring weakly at the chair next to Lewis.

A few painful seconds later and Arthur is wedged between Lewis and Vivi, arms and legs crossed, gaze averted towards the open living room door. Right now his brilliant strategy is to try and wait out his friend’s concern, hoping they’d get fed up sitting around in silence. Was it subtle? No. Not really. But Lewis and Vivi already knew something was wrong and he’s too tired to maintain the ‘everything’s good’ attitude.

Vivi clears her throat impatiently, “So Arthur.  You’re dead on your feet, your hair is a bird’s nest, and you’ve been pretty run down these last few days. Something’s happened, so spill,”

Unfortunately, his strategy relies on Vivi and Lewis caring a whole lot less than he really deserves, making for anxiety-ridden anticipation on his part.

“Gee Viv. You really know down to butter a guy up,” He goes for an awkward chuckle, trying to lighten the heavy mood. The statement lands like a wet paper plane, going by Vivi’s scowl.

“Don’t you ‘gee Viv’ me,” She jumps on the comment, “We’ve spent hundreds of hours hanging together. As if we wouldn’t notice when something’s bothering you. Give us some credit.”

He exhales uneasily, frustration itching along his shoulders, “I don’t know what you want me to say,” He starts defensively, “I went shopping, lost track of time, and have had a bit of trouble sleeping due to headaches. It really is nothing for you worry about.”

He doesn’t like being ambushed or pressed into a corner. It doesn’t help that Lewis is just sitting there, staring searchingly, not saying a word. Over the last few days, he’s relied on Lewis and Vivi being more focused on each other than on him. Having all the spotlight isn’t doing the irrationally paranoid side of his brain any favours. Claustrophobic is an apt description of his current situation.

“How about starting with why,  _exactly_ , you’re getting headaches. One or two we can chalk up to heat, but it’s almost been five days. Last I checked you only get them this bad when you’re stressed.”

“…and don’t say it’s this new project,” Vivi quickly continues, “We’ve seen you work on hobby projects before and if anything, they seem to reduce stress.”

Sometimes, it’s really inconvenient having close friends. It makes it hard to hide things.  

“Uh…it’s not the new project?” He stalls. Internally, Arthur’s mind is doing cartwheels, trying to come up with a believable excuse and regretting not putting more effort into acting normal.

Vivi frowns, almost irritated. However, Lewis interrupts her next verdict, breaking his unusually long silence, “Is this because of the paint?”

“What,” Arthur stumbles, registering the sentence a few seconds too slow, eyes flickering to meet Lewis’s then immediately away.  Now is not the time for a panic attack.

“…because I can always try and return it,” Lewis continues, deeper voice softer that Viv’s deliberately probing one.

“Come on Lew,” Vivi is directing her concern at Lewis this time, “Arthur wouldn’t be mad at you over something like that,” She hesitates and squints at him, “Right Arthur?”

“No, no, that’s not…I’m not mad about  _that_ ,” He rushes to reassure, somewhat thrown. Honestly, he had forgotten all about the excess paint. It’s been sitting in the garage, unused.

Why would Lewis think he was mad about paint of all things?

He doesn’t have the time to dissect this most recent turn because Vivi has paced a hand over his crossed arms, prompting him to momentarily freeze. The small action reminds him painfully of future Vivi, so he begrudgingly lets her untangle his limbs and thread her fingers through his.

“If you don’t tell us what’s wrong then we can’t help,” She says carefully, squeezing his hand to provide comfort. To the side, he can see Lewis nodding, equally troubled. Guilt, at causing their unneeded stress, is now mixing about with the anxiety and fatigue. In other words, he feels like shit. 

If only it were that easy. What would Arthur even say?  _‘Oh, by the way, I’m from two years in the future. It sucks. Vivi, you have amnesia and forget the man you love. Lewis, you die, somehow, then you come back as a fiery ghost and kill me. But that’s fine because I ended up time travelling instead of dying. Also, Mystery is some type of Kitsune, and maybe we shouldn’t trust him because of  reasons which may or may not involve limb removal.’_

The last two years had been an extended nightmare and more people knowing wouldn’t change anything. It would only make them all unhappy. If they even believed him. He barely believed it, and he’d lived it. No. Only one person needed to be miserable, and that person was him.

“Arthur,” Vivi is ducking, trying to get a look at his eyes, obviously taking his extended silence as a bad sign, “What’s wrong? We’re your best friends,”

He’s acting far too stubborn. Younger Arthur would have folded by now, unused to the direct attention and scrutiny. He needs to come up with something but his tiered mind drawing a whole lot of nothing.

“Maybe it’s something about this upcoming trip that has you worried,” Lewis asks cautiously.

“You can tell us,” Vivi adds.

Huh? He takes a moment to quickly glace between them. Blaming his behaviour on the road trip would be a believable excuse. It also had the bonus effect of being partly true. He latches on to the plausible explanation before he can really process its ramifications.

“I guess all this talk about supernatural hotels and haunted places has been stressing me out…” He begins, adding “More than it should,” to help fabricate his new lie. He pulls his hands away from Vivi under the guise of taking a sip of tea. It also hides a grimace.

“You do still want to come with us, right?” Lewis asks, sounding almost urgent in his question.

“Yes,” How else was he supposed to keep an eye on them, “Of course I want to come with you. I’m just a bit nervous about the other stuff. Pretty stupid, huh?” He runs a hand through his hair, puts the cup down, and gives a strained smile.  

“Okay,” Vivi says slowly, tapping a blue painted nail against the counter, seeming only somewhat disappointed, “We don’t have to do anything supernatural right now…we can start off by going to a few national parks, do some normal road tripping, see the sights and stuff. If it makes you more comfortable?”

She has been planning and anticipating this trip for so long that her instant willingness to completely restructure it on his account does not help his growing guilt. But, forcing Vivi and Lewis away from anything supernatural is really for the best. Even before encountering The Cave they’d run into a slew of problems, cultists, and crazies in their pursuit of the unknown. It’s better they skip that madness this time even if it takes a few lies on his part to do it. This is fine.

“That would be better, yeah,” He confirms awkwardly, keeping his gaze down on Vivi’s hands.

Vivi exhales wearily, “I wish you had told us this earlier. What did you think would happen?”

He grimaces, “I don’t know. We spent so much time planning…. I guess I thought I could deal with it?”

“Well, next time, tell us straight away when something’s bothering you so we can figure it out. No haunted house is worth all this,” She gestures around at the room in reference to the tense and unpleasant atmosphere.  Easy for Vivi to say, she’s always been a vocal person when it came to personal problems.

“Also, maybe tell Uncle Lance something cause he seems worried as well…” Vivi trails off, giving him a securitising stare. She seems to be in the process of settling for his explanation. For now at least. Lewis is still  _watching_  him, still mostly silent, expression neutral. It’s had to tell if he believes Arthur or not. One thing is for sure, he needs to get better at being younger Arthur because he’s apparently been worrying Vivi and Lewis more than he thought.

His hometown didn’t have a high school, being far too small, meaning he, Vivi and Lewis had travelled via school bus, for  just under an hour and a half each day, to the adjacent town. The shock,  transitioning into a significantly larger social environment, coupled with growing family drama had hit him particularly hard, resulting in, what Vivi had termed as, ‘not a great time for anyone.’ Compared to The Cave, and its extended aftermath, it was small potatoes. It was almost laughable to be bothered by trivial things like his dad being his predictable jerk self or his extended asshole family when struggling with blackouts, a presumed dead friend and varying levels of amnesia. Of course, none of that’s happened. The biggest upset this Lewis and Vivi have had concerning their three-person friendship had been those rocky high school years.

After The Cave he had quietened down into a more naturally reserved and contemplative state, happy to play off Vivi’s exaggerated fervour, becoming the sensible, straight man, to her hairbrained plans/schemes. Now Lewis is back in the picture, and he’s having trouble recapturing their old dynamic. Normal for him is not normal for younger Arthur.

“We should probably start heading off,” Lewis comments in the wake of his and Vivi’s thoughtful silence, attention flickering between the two of them. Arthur pulls his focus outward and back to the present, pushing uncomfortable revelations about the younger him to one side.

“Oh right, it’s almost eight o clock, ” Vivi jumps, checking the time, “I need to get home. Mystery still needs his walk.” She moves to stand, throwing Arthur one last half-troubled glance, “Sorry to rush off. We can sort out re-planning tomorrow after work… or the next day after, if that’s better for you Arthur,”

“Err, better make it the next day after,” He says because he’ll probably need at least a day to get himself together. Surreptitiously, he squashes his guilty relief upon hearing that they’re finally leaving him to get some much-needed sleep.

“Right, um,” She hesitates again, “don’t feel bad about the road trip stuff. We’ll figure it out.”

“Thanks, Vivi.”

“And try to get some more sleep,”

“I will,”

Lewis rises and pauses while Vivi ducks around him, starting for the front door. Arthur hesitates, caught between a sitting and standing. Lewis is watching him again.

“Guess I’ll see you in a few days,” The larger man comments, stepping back to provide more space.  

“Yeah. See you then,”

Lewis hesitates, looking like he’s about to say something else. Arthur tries to keep the nervous fidgeting to a minimum. In the end, Lewis just frowns, remaining quiet. He follows both of them to the door and can’t help but think he’s missed something important.  


	9. Thinking of the Future 1

Arthur glares at his reflection, leaning close to the mirror’s surface, scanning for imperfections. He’s been managing between four and five hours sleep a night with a careful combination of sleeping pills, anxiety meds and monitoring his caffeine intake. The dark circles, which had started to develop, are smaller and less noticeable. His younger body appears to be adapting to the sudden change in lifestyle decently enough. It’s amazing what a person is capable of when they  _haven’t_  spent several weeks lying in a hospital ward or worked themselves half to death. He stares and pulls his expression into a cheerful grin. It’s warm, inviting, the sort of smile you gave a friend upon hearing a particularly humours joke.

Perfect.

To double check, he glances down at his phone which is propped up by the mirror. A photo depicting him, Vivi and Lewis mid-laugh, school gates in the background, stares up at him. After coming to the uncomfortable realisation that he’s failing in the ‘being Arthur’ department and causing unneeded stress, he has been putting a bit more effort into engaging and being more sociable when Lewis and Vivi are around. Hence the search through his computer and phone for as many pictures of himself as possible to use as reference. There’s not a whole lot because he has never been a huge fan of photos but the ones he does find all show him either grimacing in exasperation or grinning happily alongside Lewis and Vivi. Currently, he has one as a screensaver and a few others stuffed into his wallet for extra material. The three of them, together, happy. It’s weird seeing pictures of Lewis again. After The Cave, he had had to delete or hide away most of them so Vivi wouldn’t accidentally see one and have an episode. He reaches to pick up the phone and fumbles with his left hand, almost knocking it into the toilet.

“Arthur,” Uncle Lance yells, voice filtering in from the garage, “You were plannin to leave a half hour ago. You’re not makin those friends of yours wait again are you.”

After a bit of awkward juggling, he manages to circumvent the disaster, and he lets out a long breath of relief.

“It’s okay. Everything’s on track,” Arthur calls, then flushes the toilet, letting out a tired huff. Lance isn’t one to hover, but he has been a whole lot more watchful this last week. Despite Vivi’s instance that he talk to his Uncle, he has yet to broach the topic of his odd behaviour, and Lance hasn’t openly called him out, so he’s been avoiding it mostly. It’s a familiar routine at the very least.

“You goin to keep in touch while on this road trip? Or am I just goinin to have to trust ya not to get murdered,” Lance comments when he tramps out into the reception, thin fibber door clicking behind. Arthur scoops up his overstuffed backpack and shoulder bag from the disused reception desk, slinging one over a shoulder.

“Yeah. Of course,” He gives the grin a trial run, “I’ll give you a call when we stop for the night. Unless there’s no reception, then I’ll call you tomorrow.”

His uncle frowns at him searchingly, “See that ya do.”

He doesn’t remember Lance being this worried on his first time around, but it’s possible he’s just forgotten.

“I will,” He does a small wave, stepping towards the front door, “Guess I’ll see you in a mouth then.”

The van is parked out front, full tank, packed with supplies, ready to go. All he has to do is pick up Vivi and Lewis from the Pepper’s diner. Before he makes it through the doorway, Lance grabs his lower arm, pulling him up short, “You get inta any trouble you give me a call, ya hear.”

Lance is about a head shorter than him, so he has to bend at an odd angle. Thankfully, he doesn’t flinch at the sudden contact, but it’s a near thing.

“We’re doing regular touristy things. You know, the Grand Canyon, Mt. Rushmore, stuff like that.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Hopefully.

Lance grumbles inaudible complaints under his breath and lets his arm go, giving a stern nod. Arthur rolls his eyes good-naturedly, squashing a chuckle, amazed at how natural the interaction feels. The comfortable sensation lasts up until he turns back towards his van. It’s bright orange, shinning with a fresh coat of lacquer.

There is no ‘Mystery Skulls’ logo.  

His smile falters, falling away. Of all the things he thought he would change this hadn’t been one of them. Vivi and Lewis had decided to hold off finishing the van’s design under the mistaken impression that Arthur disapproved of it. A by-product of blaming his recent change in behaviour on a fear of supernatural phenonium.  How the hell do you explain that it’s not the supernatural generally that’s the problem, just their groups’ tendency to run into danger with lethal outcomes. An increase in hovering by both his friends means that any excuse or reasoning he tries needs to be airtight or risk being picked apart by a hyper-attentive Vivi and overly watchful Lewis. So… no ‘Mystery Skulls’ logo.  

With a sigh, he approaches, running his left hand across its smooth, unmarked, surface. Somewhat forcefully, he yanks open the door, throwing his bag into the back and settling into the driver’s seat. Time to go pick up his overly attentive friends and spend the next few weeks exclusively in their company, with no breaks and possibly sharing the same tent and motel rooms.

He’s  _so_  not ready for this. If they don’t notice his weird sleeping habits, then they are sure to see when he inevitably slips up in his acting. Arthur slaps his cheeks with both hands, taking a few more deep breaths, thinking of Vivi and Lewis, both of whom were waiting.

It’s too late to worry about that now. Everything is okay.  _This will be fine._

The van rumbles to life and he waves at Lance one last time. The older man is standing in the doorway, arms crossed, eyes tracking Arthur as he expertly reverses and spins the van onto the highway.

. . .

Pepper Paradiso is located on the same highway as Kingsman Mechanics, just on the opposite side of town. It’s hard to miss, being painted in bright shades of pink and purple. Sporting wide, stain-glass windows, the building is almost alarming in its contrast with the browns and dull greens of the surrounding desert.

“Arthur!”

Vivi greets when he pulls in, bobbing about in poorly contained excitement. The smoothly paved lot encircling the front of the Pepper’s diner is mostly empty, not uncommon for the early morning, and he pulls straight into a spot near the double door entrance. Lewis is in standing in the middle of what looks like a family huddle. Both senior Peppers are there, and he’s got one of his little sisters sitting atop his shoulders. A wistful smile tugs at Arthur’s lips. He’d spent many days during his extended quest to find Lewis dominated by a fear that he would fail and never see the Pepper family, happy, all together, ever again. This is nice.

Vivi jogs up, and Arthur shakes the melancholic thoughts away, winding down his window so he can hear while he finishes up parking. Mystery is trotting alongside her, and he tries not to give the dog any overt attention. This last week he’s been working to gauge how much Mystery knows but the dog is just too good at being a dog for him to get a proper read.

“There you are. Almost thought you’d forgotten again. Then we would have had to postpone things till the afternoon and miss a whole day’s worth of driving.”

Arthur can almost taste the slight underlining tension which now pops up whenever he forgets or doesn’t behave in a way that’s expected. Vivi’s on the lookout for behaviour flags. Luckily, he’s got a lot of experience dodging Vivi’s pointed questions.

“Yeah, sorry, it took me more time to pack than I anticipated. Also, Lance wanted to say bye as well. That took a bit longer than I thought it would.”

He hits her with  _the grin_  he’s just spent the last half hour perfecting in the mirror. It’s a success because Vivi relaxes and grins back.

“Heh. You’re not the only one,” She gestures at Lewis and his family huddle, “You would think he’s leaving for good with the way they’re acting.”

“They are a pretty affectionate people,” He responds, quashing the strain in his voice. Vivi doesn’t notice, now focused on Lewis again. Don’t think about it. This time Lewis _is_ going to return. He’ll make sure of it.

“Hey, Lew. Look who finally showed up,” Vivi calls over, waving. Lewis, one sister still on his shoulders and another dragging at his arm, tries to turn and almost topples over. Vivi snorts in amusement. Her shout also attracts the attention of Lewis’s family. Cayenne, the little red-haired menace, immediately runs over to jump around just below his window.  

“Arthur. Arthur is this your van! It’s cool. Can I come in? Pleeaasse.”

“You’ve been in the van before,” He says with only a slight hint of apprehension. Cayenne used to be pretty big on pranking from what he remembers. After Lewis’s disappearance, her Arthur-targeted jokes had become less frequent, almost non-existent.  But, since that hasn’t happened, he should probably be on the lookout.

“But now it’s orange!” Cayenne shouts enthusiastically, jumping up, trying to get a look in.  

Vivi sniggers, “She’s got you there Arthur.”

He opens his mouth to object but is beaten to it by Lewis, “I’m sure the van’s too full to fit you in. Maybe, when we get back, Arthur will give you a ride if you ask nicely.”

“Aww. No fair,”  Cayenne pouts, throwing a look back towards Mr and Ms Pepper like she’s hoping for Lewis’s verdict to be overridden. Lewis crosses his arms, appearing about as stern as one can with Paprika, who’s covered in copious amounts of ribbon and lace, sitting on his shoulders, clinging and messing up his hair.

“Cayenne,” Comes an amused grumble from the older Pepper, “Make yourself useful and go help Belle with your brother’s bag,”

A few feet away Belle is attempting to move Lewis’s fully packed duffle-bag with minimal success. Arthur swears Cayenne gives him the evil eye on her way past, and he shivers, feeling like he’s dodged a bullet. Paprika also scrambles down off Lewis’s shoulders to join Cayenne. Together, the three girls manage to lift the bag despite taking the time to stop and squabble among themselves.

Lance sighs, watching his sisters merger progress, and loosens, turning to an amused Vivi, “She’s had this thing about fart bombs this last week. Don’t know where they’ve come from but I, for one, don’t want to suffer for the next eight hours.”

Vivi laughs, “Good thinking.”

Mystery barks, jumping around, acting every bit the excited dog, energised by the surrounding activity.

They watch Cayenne, Belle and Paprika attempt to drag over Lewis’s bag, stumbling when Mystery gets caught underfoot. He ends up climbing out of the van to help Vivi load up her last two packs, one of which is full of books going by the weight, while she runs off to corral her fake dog.  So far, everything’s off to a good start. Lewis is too distracted saying goodbye to his family and Vivi is fussing over Mystery.

Now. If Arthur can just keep it together for the next eight hours, then everything would be perfect.

. . .

 

The first few hours on the road are almost relaxing. Lewis drives, Vivi and Mystery sit up front, and he has plenty of space alone in the back. Arthur doesn’t get carsick like Lewis does so he’s fine with sitting in the small, makeshift seat which he’s installed for this very reason, letting the engine vibrations calm his nerves. This set up has bothered him in the past. Now he’s just happy to watch Vivi and Lewis chat and joke together.

Everything is perfect right up until Vivi suggests, rather forcefully, that he take a turn driving up front with Lewis and Mystery while she takes a turn in the back. She’s been doing this a lot- trying to get him to interact with Lewis- and he has no idea why, only that it hasn’t been great for his anxiety levels.  Unable to really argue, not without seeming like a jerk, Arthur takes the driver’s seat wearily. At the very least, he doesn’t have to worry about accidentally making eye contact with his full attention on the road.

Gradually, he drives them through some nice-looking sloped ridges, almost mountains, following the road as it winds upward, higher and higher. Lush greens and dark browns are a nice change from the monotone desert he’s used to. Vivi seems to enjoy it, leaning over the middle seat divide, eyes fixed on the pristine landscape. Right. This is Vivi’s first time leaving the claustrophobic collection of small towns surrounding their even smaller township, of course she is going to find it fascinating.

Now, if only Lewis could be equally fascinated with the abundant natural beauty instead of fixating on Arthur’s profile. He swears he’s been acting as normal as conceivably possible, yet Lewis is still behaving like he’s got some strange dirt on his face.  Why? Why can’t they all go back to that easy friendship from his memories?  _Why is it so hard to just be himself?_

“So I haven’t seen you online this last week?” Lewis finally comments, breaking his extended period of staring. There is a pause while he waits for Arthur to respond.

“Online?”  Arthur keeps his vision fixed on the slowly straightening road. They are now following along the top of one of the ridges.

“Your game accounts and chatrooms. You’ve been inactive lately. I was just wondering if there was a reason for that,” Lewis repeats, almost apprehensive.

“Oh yeah. Right…online games.”

Had he still been playing those at this point? He could have sworn he had drifted away from them by now.

“I’ve been busy working on this prosthetics project. I have this new idea on how to convert neuro-transmissions into electrical pulses, and I think it’s going to be pretty useful if I nail it,” Arthur can’t help but smile, happy that the excuse has a little bit of truth to it.

“That sounds…” Lewis pauses, surprised, “pretty big actually.”

“It will be once I get it working,”

It  _had_  been a somewhat significant breakthrough in his original timeline, a collaboration with researchers at the St Peter’s Medical Research Foundry, and his unhealthy work ethic. Now he is recreating everything solo and finding it a tad more difficult, especially with salvaged and sub-par equipment. As much as he had hated the hospital, the labs had been pretty cool. It’s also doing an excellent job at distracting him from his increasingly horrific nightmares.

“Still think a ghost detection device would have been cool,” Vivi pouts from the back, still mostly focused on the landscape rushing past. Out the window is a spectacular view of the adjacent valley.

Arthur grimaces, responding,  “Sorry Viv. You know I’ve been avoiding that sort of thing,” to keep with his ‘dislike of the supernatural’ image.

Vivi is now a lot more focused on the conversation because she quickly elaborates, “Oh no, don’t apologise. I’m just fantasising a little. Prosthetics are way more important.”  

Arthur is hit with a small pang of renewed guilt. Maybe, when they get back, and he finally gets to see that psychologist he probably needs, he’ll miraculously get over his fear, and they can go ghost hunting for real. A ghost detection device would actually be pretty useful for avoiding potential disasters.

Lewis clears his throat, “About that. I know you’ve said that you’re apprehensive about investigating superstitions and supernatural locations, but I was wondering, and I’m not accusing you of anything… but I’ve noticed that you seem to bit more…jumpy lately.”

“Eh?”  

That wasn’t good. So Lewis  _had_  noticed his aversions. His grip tightens around the steering wheel.

“If there’s anything I can do to help. Or if I can do anything, I don’t know, differently…” Lewis continues, speaking carefully, oblivious to his uneasiness, “You can always let me know. You know…”

This is not what he wants to be discussing.

He can’t tell if Lewis is disapproving or if he’s subconsciously adding texture where there is none. In his mind’s eye, he can almost see ghost Lewis glaring, angry and accusing. Everything is growing very hot and stuffy, van door and low ceiling pressing in on him.

_Flames are drawing in close, licking at his clothes._

Crap. He needs out of the driver’s seat before he drives them to their deaths.

“Hey look! There’s a View Point. Let’s check it out,” He blurts, spinning the steering wheel with more urgency than strictly needed. Vivi cries out in surprise and Mystery yelps as he is flung onto Lewis’s lap. Everything rotates, left wheel briefly lifting from the pavement, and they rocket down a narrow exit ramp.

“Arthur! What the heck,” Vivi squawks from the back, popping back up from where she’s toppled over, slightly frazzled. His heart is beating exceptionally fast, and he slows the van to a more manageable speed. The last thing he wants to do is crash.

“A little warning next time. Geez. I could have died back there, ” Vivi complains when they pull into a small parking bay. She doesn’t appear to have noticed his unsubtle ploy to quickly end his conversation with Lewis. Ahead of them is a sheltered enclave, enclosed by rock walls which raise up to meet the highway they had just exited.  

“Sorry. Sorry. I just saw this turn and thought you’d want to stop and take a photo or something,” Arthur defends even as he’s leaping out the driver’s seat to get clear of both Lewis and Mystery. In the few seconds he is out of view, obscured by the bulk of the van, Arthur takes a moment to collect himself. He presses himself against the van’s cool surface, hand over his chest, feeling out his heart and natural rhythm. Slowly, he counts his breaths, wrestling with a brief bout of slightly blurry vision.

“Wow!”

Vivi, who has flung open the back of the van, climes out, standing near him. She is staring happily out at the vast, open space. The brilliant blue sky stretches away infinitely and before them is a collection landscape, ridges, and valleys sprawling for miles. They have stopped at an official View Point, with several wooden plaques containing information on local frontier towns and an accompanying area map.

“Guess this is worth almost dying for,” She goes to give him a half-playful wack in the arm. The right arm, thankfully.

“Haha. Don’t joke about that,” Arthur mutters, trying to shake the lingering jitters as quickly as possible. Briefly, he makes eye contact with Mystery who is standing at Vivi’s feet. The dog is staring, head cocked to one side, considering Arthur with intelligent eyes. The appearance of intellect is broken when Mystery turns to scratch an ear with his back leg.

Vivi walks to lean against the railing, which cordons off the steeper part of the slope, pulling out her phone to take pictures. The wind pulls at, and whips about, her hair and short blue skirt. Arthur averts his gaze awkwardly and accidentally makes eye contact with Lewis who is walking around from the passenger’s side. The taller man is watching again, expression creased into a deep frown, slightly hurt. Arthur looks away guiltily. What, exactly, Lewis is thinking, he doesn’t know, but it’s probably nothing good.

“Hey check that out,” Vivi calls, “You can see the start of the desert from here.”  

“Guys,” Vivi turns when they fail to answer, taking in the awkward distance between them. A second and they’re all silent, listening to the wind rustle the branches of nearby foliage.  

“Come on then. Let’s take a picture together. First one of the trip.” Vivi motions for them to stand side by side, putting the wide vista in the background. Her eye’s move between them once again before she is distracted be a shiver brought about by another gust.

“It’s actually a lot cooler up here then it was done there.”

“Who would have thought,” Lewis jokes, voice light with only a hint of leftover unease from their standoff. Looks like they’ve all collectively decided to ignore the last few seconds of tension. For now anyway. He’ll find some time to talk to Lewis later when he’s in a better mindset.  Arthur lets out the breath he has been holding.

“You can have my jacket if you want,” Lewis is offering, walking up to the railing, sounding more natural. Arthur notes that that drop down isn’t particularly steep, being more of an incline.  

“Keep your jacket, you know I have a pack of extra clothes,” Vivi huffs, now motioning them impatiently into a clump so she can take the picture. It is only somewhat uncomfortable. Good thing he’s practised smiling.

The rest of the drive goes smoothly with Arthur insisting that he return to sitting at the back, alone. It’s telling when Vivi doesn’t fight him on it, letting him retreat in peace. They lose three hours at another rest stop, this one bordering a wide forested area, when Vivi insists Mystery get a chance to stretch his legs. Arthur opts to sit in the bed of his van among their various bags, doors secure outward, giving him a view of Vivi and Lewis as they throw a ball for Mystery.

The fresh air, the smell of pine, and the gentle rustling of wind are familiar in a way he has come to expect, having lived similar scenarios on his previous road trips.  What isn’t familiar is the creeping isolation and disconnection from Vivi and, to a lesser extent, Lewis. Sure, he had often felt left out and ignored in his original timeline, but it had never been so defined. Not that he can complain, this had been his goal after all.


	10. Thinking of the Future 2

They soon exchange high sloping ridges for more desert flatland, pulling into a shabby town on sunset. It’s not as small as their own township, but it definitely has that slightly unkept feel Arthur associates with paces seeing high traffic with few long term residences. Isolated along a stretch of mostly empty highway the town's primary function- going by the collection of trucks parked between its many gas stations-appeared to be giving long-haul travellers a place to sleep.

Arthur has already picked out a motel among their limited options. A dishevelled building with a single row of rooms and empty car spaces. There is a small, box-like brick structure out front acting as the reception, and they are given a key by a woman who’s more interested in reading a magazine then interacting. Nothing is labelled, not even the door numbers, and they have to count their way down the row to get to the right room.

“Yuck,” Vivi’s loud comment drifts back from where she’s stepped into their temporary accommodation, “I’m going to have trouble sleeping with this mess distracting me all night.”

Arthur locks his van, giving the silent windows on either side of them a suspicions squint, stepping up onto the small stretch of pavement bordering the wooden motel door.  

“It’s not that bad,” Lewis chuckles, stepping around into the room, giving Arthur a better view.

“ _You_  would say that,” Vivi retorts, “Seriously, I wonder about your sense of taste sometimes Lew.”

 _Cramped_ , is his first thought. Arthur inches into the room behind Lewis, eyeing the hideous pink and purple floral wallpaper. It’s an eyesore, and he’s not crazy about the colour. That, coupled with several overlapping old Persian rugs, gives the whole space a busy, claustrophobic vibe like the walls and floor are crowing in around them.

“It was the cheapest place that allowed pets,” He contributes to defend his choice, eyeballing the tassels on one of the rugs which has caught the edge of the door, preventing it from opening completely.

“Hey. I wasn’t complaining. Just making an observation,” Vivi amends, giving the small room another judgmental stare.

“Also…There are only two beds,” Lewis interjects, motioning pointedly at the two double beds which occupy a majority of the room’s floor space. Actually, apart from the beds, there is only a scratched-up desk, chair, and door leading to an equally sad bathroom. How a room so sparse could feel so hectic was anyone’s guess.

“I can sleep in the van,” Arthur offers quickly, glancing between Vivi and Lewis. He’s not 100% sure how long they’ve been dating, and he doesn’t want to make things uncomfortable or get in their way. Also, if he sleeps in the van, he doesn’t have to worry about Vivi and Lewis noticing his nightmares, so it’s a win-win.

“No,“ Lewis’s attention swings onto Arthur, intense and penetrating, "I’ll sleep in the van. You stay in here Arthur. You need the rest more than me.”

“My sleep schedule is fine,” He protests weekly, forcing himself not to shuffle right back out the door to escape, “and I’m shorter so I’ll be more comfortable in the van.”

“No one is sleeping in the van,” Vivi interrupts, voice firm, “We’ll have plenty of opportunities to sleep in the van later. For now, Lewis, we’ll share a bed and build pillow wall between us, so everything stays nice and G-rated,”

“Uh,” Lewis chokes, focus flipping off Arthur like a rubber-band. He coughs, face reddening ever so slightly, “If you’re okay with that…then I’m fine sleeping with you. I mean, not  _with you_  with you, but, ah, you know.” Another cough.

“Of course I’m fine, why wouldn’t I be?” Vivi’s also gone a light pink, but she also has a hand over her mouth to hide an amused grin. Lewis is still stuttering, growing more flustered by the second. Maybe Arthur has misremembered just how far along they were in this relationship, or maybe, younger Arthur had blown things out in this head like the depressed drama queen he’d been.  

Either way, both his friends have momentarily forgotten about his existence, giving Arthur an excuse to escape the oppressive space and clear his head. He steps backward and out onto the pavement and almost trips over Mystery. A growl-like yelp follows the action. Arthur leaps up a pace, flinching to the side, startled. He stumbles on the small step, thankfully falling against the front of his van and not onto the concrete.

“Sorry…Mystery. Didn’t see you there,” He comments shakily, straightening, eyeing up the dog.

The last of the setting sun reflects in Mystery’s eyes, giving them an ominous red tint. There is no denying the intelligence, bubbling just beneath his facade. Arthur swallows, arms and legs locking up, tense and ready to run. He should probably try for a pat like he usually would, but his apprehension is well on its way to fear and panic, so he doesn’t bother pushing himself.

Luckily, Mystery seems content to watch in silence, and Arthur eventually gathers the courage needed to shuffle around to the van’s side door and retrieve his shoulder bag and phone. The dog, after a few elongated seconds of watching, heads into the motel room to involve himself in whatever awkward flirting Lewis and Vivi are participating in.

Arthur releases a slow breath, fiddling with his phone. He should call Uncle Lance while he has the chance and make good on his promise. Not that they’ll have much to say to each other, he has only been gone a day, but he should give it a go anyway. _One stilted phone conversation coming right up._ Arthur dials. The call goes through to voice mail after a couple of rings.

“Hey, Arthur! What are you doing out here?”

Vivi is leaning out of the motel room to get a look at the van and Arthur who is now sitting in the front passenger seat. Lewis also glances out from above Vivi’s head, giving Arthur another one of those scrutinising stares.

“Just giving my uncle a call, so he doesn’t panic thinking we’ve crashed or something,” He answers, shrugging naturally, putting his phone away. Uncle Lance is probably caught up in the workshop or has left his phone in an odd location where he can’t find it. He’s done it before.    

“Yeah. I should probably do that too,” Lewis responds, relaxing his gaze, “Can’t have my family worrying.”

“I don’t know what they think I’m doing when I hang out with you two,” Lewis trails off one part humour one part in exasperation, attention now focused on his phone, disappearing back inside.

Vivi smiles at Lewis’s back, snickering, before turning to Arthur.

“So, me and Lewis are sharing a bed, and you get the one near the window,” She explains, walking towards him. Arthur takes the opportunity to lean over the seat divide so he can hand Vivi her backpack along with Lewis’s duffel bag when she nears the door.

“Unless you have any objections,” She peers at him while he climbs back out of the van, shutting and locking it behind him. Around them, the silent motel lot darkens, and the one, solitary street light flickers on.

“It’s fine,” He reassures even if he would have rather slept in the van, “Though, you’re right about the motel’s decor. Next time, I’m only picking a place if it has photos.”

Vivi giggles, “It’s like Mrs Gale threw up. Bet she would love it here.”

Arthur laughs weakly at the dig at Vivi’s boss, unable to summon enough energy to really engage. He stifles a yawn. And he still needs to come up with an explanation for Lewis, clarifying his erratic behaviour from earlier that morning.

“Alright. Let’s get hyped for some sleep. Tomorrow the actual road trip starts,” Vivi does a small fist pump, grabbing his hand and pulling him back inside where Lewis is chatting on the phone, sitting on the far bed, back facing them. Mystery is stretched out diagonally across the sheets, forcing Vivi to push him off so she can construct a pillow wall to separate her and Lewis.

Everything is relatively fine-bar a few stiff exchanges with Lewis in which he successfully puts off explaining anything- up until they all head to bed.

Arthur ends up staring at motel ceiling long into the night. Hours tick slowly by while he traces the interlocking lines of the busy floral patterns plastered up above him. Gradually, second by second, eleven o'clock becomes twelve, then twelve becomes one. Around two in the morning Arthur releases a tiered frustrated sigh which is amplified a hundred fold by the oppressive silence.  

This isn’t working.

He reaches for his keys, easily spotted in the dark due to the bulky multi-tool, knife and other useful knick-knacks he has attached, finding the room key alongside them. For a few seconds, he listens for Vivi and Lewis’s soft breathing and Mystery’s huffs, figuring they’re probably in a deep sleep by now. Quietly, he inches out the motel room’s door, shutting it softly behind him with a barely audible click.

The gentle hum of crickets and the occasional sound of tiers on the main road are a welcome change from the motel room’s muffled silence. There are several more cars in the parking lot now, all illuminated by cool moonlight. Arthur takes a deep breath and lets himself relax. Drowsily, he climbs into the van, collapsing across the front seat, too tired to clear a space in the back among the camping gear and other supplies. 

Before finally drifting off to sleep he sets his alarm for five thirty so he can sneak back into the motel room before Lewis and Vivi wake up.

. . . 

_Purple fire runs over the arched stone walls, lighting his way downward, beckoning him deeper into the tunnel. Arthur hesitates, reluctant to continue, fear heavy on his shoulders. There’s something dangerous moving among the flames, immune to the heat. His footsteps echo, loud, broadcasting his position._

_“Lewis?” He calls. Nothing responds. The fire continues to burn, eerie in its silence._

_In the dim flickering light Arthur stumbles. He reaches out a hand to steady himself, accidentally bushing against the flames. A burning sensation shoots along his left arm, and it goes completely numb._

_He watches it slowly turn sickly green._

Arthur is jerked into consciousness by the insistent buzzing of his phone wedged into the seat next to his ear. His head is heavy like it’s been filled with cotton, and his back and shoulders ache from his odd position. Despite it not being particularly hot, he’s sweating all over, breathing harder than normal. With a groan, he heaves himself up, studying the dashboard, steering wheel, and plush seats.

This isn’t The Cave. He’s fine.

Out the window, he can see the sun peeping between buildings. Sore, disorientated and drowsy, Arthur shuffles blearily out and down from the van, stumbling up to the motel room door, unlocking it, and slipping back inside. He stifles a yawn.

As he turns to lock the door behind him, movement on his left catches his attention.

“Arthur?” The familiar deep voice shatters the quiet, piercing through the tried haze resting over his thoughts. A hand reaches out to rest on his shoulder.

Arthur jerks around, brain activity going from zero to ten in an instant. His heart skips. His breath catches.

Lewis is right there and _…Fire erupts, consuming the motel room, disintegrating furniture, and flaking away the wallpaper. At the centre of this sudden inferno is Lewis, glaring. Frames are racing up his arm to Arthur’s shoulder, catching in his clothes, spreading across his torso. The ground falls away on either side of him into a steep drop. Sharp, glistening spikes beckon to him._

_“THIS IS YOUR FAULT!”_

_The words are defining, shrieking out from the fire. Disembodied._

_Arthur throws himself backward, ripping himself free, _his need to run too great to ignore_. He fully expects to plummet down off the cliff._

Instead, his back and head hit a solid surface, forcing painful vibrations through his skull.

Disoriented, he slaps a hand up and behind to feel wooden panels. He blinks at his fuzzy vision, staring down at the tasselled rug, running under him. Shakely, he feels it’s softness with his flesh and blood left hand, not quite comprehending its existence.

There’s no fire. No cliff. He is on a carpeted floor, leaning against a door. A frozen Lewis is standing a foot away, hand outstretched, frozen in place from where he’s tried to touch Arthur’s shoulder.

 _This is the motel room_  his brain unhelpfully provides. The motel room he’s sharing with Lewis and Vivi. Arthur tries to say something, he doesn’t know exactly what, maybe he wants to apologise, but he can’t find the breath needed. Air just isn’t making it into his lungs. 


	11. Thinking of the Future (Lance)

Lance halts his work when the natural light, afforded by the open roller doors, dims, forcing him to strain his eyes. He  _could_  flip on the floodlights, but his patience for the fiddley wiring threaded through his current project is trying his nerves enough that he’s in danger of screwing himself over. It’s best Lance start the end of day routine before he does something he’ll regret. The car is causing a bit of grief, and he’ll need a second set of hands for some of the more complicated stuff he has planned, meaning he’ll have to wait for one of his numbskull employees to arrive in the morning.

The garage’s roller doors rattle shut, clanking when they hit the concrete, reverberating about the shop. Lance has grown too used to having a second mechanic around. Arthur’s always been a genius when it came to the more techy side of mechanic work, something he’s come to rely on. He is already missing the kid, and it hasn’t even been a day. Maybe that’s the source of the gut feeling telling him that something, somewhere was going very wrong.  

Lance grabs his phone on his way out of the workshop so he’ll hear when Arthur calls. It’s normal to be concerned for your kid when they go off on an extended trip, right? This is standard parent stuff. Right? Lance tucks the phone into this back pocket.

Sure, Arthur suddenly defaulting into his passive defensive ‘I’m not going to answer your questions,’ mode, is concerning. The boy went from relatively talkative and energetic to quiet and pensive seemingly overnight. It’s not the depressive anxiousness either.  _That_  he knows how to deal with. Oh, there’s anxiety there by the bucket loads, but it is melancholic and reserved now, like Arthur’s not telling him something.

But… Maybe, he’s worrying over nothing. Perhaps this road trip is the fix Arthur’s been needing. Maybe, he’s misreading Arthur’s strange increases in nervousness. Lance exhales long and hard. He knows Arthur is his own person and an adult to boot, but, as the boy’s closest worthwhile relative, he’s worried. To call him concerned would be an understatement.

Tiredly, Lance moves through the makeshift reception room, switching off Kingsman Mechanics’ neon street sign and making to kick away the block wedging open the front door. Predictably, the door jams when he attempts to pull it close, and he is part way through prying it lose when he catches the sound of footsteps in the driveway.

Lance pauses in an attempt to catch any further noise, sticking his head out to squint at the darkening lot. Nothing jumps out as being strange but the low lighting is hampering his vision so he can’t be sure.

“Freeze, old man.”

The gruff voice sounds suddenly from just around the front entryway. Lance tilts his head sideward, taking in the half-obscured form of a heavy-set figure. From this angle, he can make out a leather vest and the shape of a compact handgun.

“Come on out, and step away from the door,” The gun is waved loosely, carelessly.  Lance scowls and opens the door wide.

“You got a problem mate,” He answers casually, stepping out hands partially raised, “If you’re lookin for money it’s locked in the till behind that desk. There aint a lot there mind you.”

The figure snorts, seemingly amused, “Yeah no. I’m not here for cash buddyo. Just here to ask a few questions is all.”

“And that needs to be done at gunpoint?”

Lance turns his head subtlety to get a better look at what he’s dealing with. A man on the taller side, dressed in leathers which are all badly scuffed like he’s already been in a fight.  Previous injuries would give Lance an advantage in a one-to-one brawl and maybe negate the height difference. Lance would have to be the one to initiate to even the odds which currently weren’t in his favour. To the side, Lance thinks he can make out the shape of a motorcycle, the only new addition to the parking lot.

“Eh,” He gets a loose shrug as a response to his question, “It gets results. You humans do love your guns. A match made in heaven if I may be so bold.”

Lance mentally ups the man’s danger levels, adding possible mental instability to his assessment.

“And what is this important question?” He asks to humour the potential crazy person.

“Oh, it’s an easy one. I’m looking for an Arthur. Apparently, he works here.”

Lance blames the unexpected nature of the question to the twitch of his upper lip, giving away his relation. Of all the things he expected this nutjob to ask, it hadn’t been that. He’s now very glad Arthur isn’t around.

“Oh oh, what was that, do you  _know_  Arthur,” The nutjob catches the twitch and takes an attentive step into Lance’s range. Lance can now see the other’s squashed, slightly beat up, facial features, full beard, and prying green eyes. Damn it. Arthur did always have the worst sort of luck, but it had never followed him home like this.

“Is he around?” The nutjob is still talking,  “Where does he…”

Lance throws himself sideways, slamming into the figure with his full weight, taking them both to the ground hard. No way in hell he’s waiting around for this nutjob to shoot him and go after Arthur. The gun goes spinning, flung into the air by the sudden impact.

“Ahh. Shit,” The taller man responds, hitting the dirt gravel of the parking lot with Lance on top of him. Lance brings his elbow down on the man’s ribs, twisting to get leverage. He’s sure he’s broken something but the nutjob twists and wiggles like nothing. Hands shoot up and grip either side of Lance’s head as if to bring him in for a headbutt. The hold is weak, and Lance moves to knock the limbs away and maybe break a few more bones while he’s at it.

Briefly, Lance makes eye contact with his attacker.

Green.

Lance just managers to register the eye colour when he’s struck by the oddest sensation of slipping to the side and falling back all at once. His muscles lock up, freezing him despite attempts at delivering a punch to the temple. Acid green sparks across his vision like his eyes are covered in a thin film of cellophane.

“Geez old man. You’re wrecked. Did no one ever tell you to bend with the knees when you were a kid,” Lance hears himself say, and it is wrong because he still can’t move and he definitely hadn’t said anything.  

Suddenly, his body is stumbling up and away from the wrestling match, reaching with a twitching hand towards the discarded gun a few feet away. His legs take a jerky step, halting awkwardly, then stepping again in a slightly smoother movement. His eyes blink several times in quick succession. One by one every one of his muscles twitches experimentally.

Of its own accord, his hand grips the gun, turning it back on the leather-vested nutjob. Said nutjob is clumsy stumbling away in wide, frantic movements, attempting to start up the bike Lance had noted earlier.

“Where are you going in such a hurry,” Lance hears himself comment and feels his finger seek out the gun’s trigger. Jesus. He’s going to shoot this guy, and there’s nothing Lance can do to stop himself.

“Bastard,” The nutjob coughs wetly at him, managing to mount the bike.  

The first gunshot goes wide.

The bike splutters to life, wheels throwing up gravel. The second shot appears to hit the other man’s shoulder. The bike wobbles dangerously, its rider slumping, definitely hurt. It still makes it out onto the highway, disappearing into the dark.

“Oh bugger. Always the fine motor control. Every time,” Lance listens to himself complain, all the while tracking the disappearing figure, “and I was looking forward to killing that one. Shame.”

 _What madness was this?_  It’s tight. Lance still can’t move. Everything about him feels like it’s been suspended in time. Inactive.

“Wasn’t it obvious? With the possession an all, I thought it would be obvious,” He answers his own question. The full body twitching, which had been an ongoing thing for the last few seconds, finishes. His body now moves in smooth and confident strides, walking out onto the empty highway, staring to where the nutjob-who maybe wasn’t a nutjob after all-had made his escape.

 _Demon?_  The thought comes unbidden, almost unbelievable.  

“Bingo. Guess there’s a brain in here after all.”

How? It couldn’t be true. None of that stuff was true. It was all bullshit to scare idiots into behaving.

“Rude,” The creature laughs with his mouth, making a sweeping gesture with one of his arms, “You can’t say I’m not real when I’m sitting right here.”

Lance is suddenly very aware of a creeping malice, threading its way into and through his mind. Something dangerous is wiggling into his memories, pulling them apart, searching.  _Looking_. Every instinct is telling him to run. Not that those instincts can do him a lot of good now.

Something buzzes in his pocket. His phone. Lance’s stomach sinks and dread settles in.

“Hmm,” He, the demon, reaches around for the phone, pulling it up. A sense of knowing realisation echoes about Lance’s mind when he sees the user ID, “What do you know. A call from one Arthur Kingsman just the human I’m after. Should I answer and ask him to come home because his dear old uncle misses him? You do miss him quite a lot. It’s sickening really.”

 _What do you want with Arthur?_   Lance attempts to project anger over his growing fear. It’s a strategy that may have worked in the past. Now, all he gets is an increased sense of vulnerability.

The call stops, unanswered, and the demon flips the phone around and back into his pocket. The creature’s amusement echoes about his brain, overwhelming and unnerving.

“A random kid with double the spiritual essence sends a couple of chumps to release me from a century-long imprisonment? Have to say…It’s piqued my interest. I’m not about to let that sort of thing go. Not without giving a little thank you at least.”

The reasoning is nonsensical. Lance doesn’t understand.  _He’s missing information._

“Hell yeah, you’re missing some info. You don’t know jack about your nephew. Which really is a shame. Now, the question is, how do I get little Artie to come home because I’d hate to have to chase the kid across the country,”

_Leave him alone ya bastard._

“How about this: Poor Uncle Lance, tragically found dead, the victim of a home invasion gone wrong. Hmm. You think that would get his attention?”

If he dies, Arthur would be alone. Again. He can’t do that to the kid. The creature seems amused at his growing panic, “Oh calm down. I’m not going to kill you. Yet. Sides, my last body just ran off to bleed out on the side of this road somewhere, so I’m stuck with your stiff sack for the time being.”

“I was thinking more along the lines off stabbing myself than letting one of those ‘numbskull’ employees find me.”

_That’ll kill me!_

“Please. I know my way around the human body. All I have to do is get my timing right, and I’ll be seeing little Artie very soon.”

 _Piece of shit. No good. Bastard. Leave my nephew alone. I’ll kill ya if you touch him. I”LL KILL YA!_  Lance rails hatefully against the creature. The sentences bounce about, dissipating.  Amusement and faint laughter are what he gets back. Any remaining sense of touch and control vanishes, his vision blackens, diming. Lance finds himself trapped in a silent, eternal dark with nothing but his fear for Arthur and a sense of failure. 


	12. Thinking of the Future 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to [loveallthing](https://loveallthing.tumblr.com/) for creating wonderful fan art of this chapter [(LINK)](https://loveallthing.tumblr.com/post/182895948636/have-i-told-you-how-much-i-love-it-hurts-your) go check it out.

Just breath! Why is that so hard? Arthur tries to block out Lewis’s looming form, the busy hotel room, and his regret at not being able to hold himself together for  _one_ day. There’s definitely going to be questions now! The patterns on the Persian rug running beneath him stretch out, elongating, tunnelling away. His chest is tight. Really tight.

“What’s going on?”

Vivi’s alarmed question draws his attention. She’s sitting up in bed, alert, partway to standing, both confused and startled. Mystery is jumping off the bed, coming towards him.

“I don’t know!” Lewis is responding, voice cracking in distress, “He flipped out when I touched him. I think it’s a panic attack.”

“What?!” Is Vivi’s high pitched response.

Lewis turns towards him, taking a small step closer, “Arthur? Are you okay?”

Too close!

“Stop,” Arthur snaps, holding out a hand and Lewis freezes again. The hand that’s not pointed at Lewis clutches at the shirt around his chest like it’ll help loosen the knot cutting off his air. If everything could just stop for two seconds, then maybe he’d have a chance at pulling himself together.

Swiftly, he doesn’t even register her move, Vivi kneels before him. She’s an arm’s length away, in line with Lewis, hovering cautiously.

“Arthur?” She starts then hesitates. Arthur stares at Vivi, and he’s momentarily transported back to when it was just her, him and Mystery, scouring the country for a friend they’d probably never find. No Lewis. No motel room. Just them and long stretches of empty highway.

“You’re panicking, but, ah, you’re okay. This is going to pass all you need to do is breath. Uh,“ Vivi falters, unsure, “We’re in the hotel room near Oak Ridge remember.”

 _“Those nightmares you get? You always say this name, ugh, I can’t remember it now. But it always seems important. What was it?”_  Vivi would sometimes ask. Then he’d lie and say it was nothing.

“Lewis back up a bit. He needs more space,” Current, present Vivi, waves Lewis back a few steps. Mystery also retreats. His, Future-Vivi, was a whole lot better at the whole ‘comforting thing’ but the small comparison is settling his nerves. The air is back, he can finally breathe, and his vision is clearing.  With renewed clarity comes a sinking sense of worry. He’s only had two bad panic attacks in this time line-not including the ones he’s had since travelling back in time-, both of them occurred several years ago after hearing distressing news. Vivi was only there for one of them, but it freaked her out enough that she’s not going to just let this go. Not when it’s the most recent in a long line of odd behaviours.  

“What happened?” Vivi is asking Lewis. She inches forward enough to take Arthur’s outstretched hand, gently pushing it down while rubbing calming circles on his upper arm. The motel room descends into an uneasy quiet while Lewis thinks over his response.

“I don’t know,” Lewis sounds torn, almost frustrated, “I woke up and saw him by the door. I thought something was wrong, so I said his name and touched his shoulder.”

“It’s nothing. You just scared me,” Arthur’s voice cracks slightly, “It was just the shock. Wasn’t expecting it.”

Both Vivi and Lewis stare in disbelieving silence.

“That wasn’t nothing,” Surprisingly, Lewis is the first to call him out on his blatant lie, “That wasn’t just a small shock…you were terrified!”

“I’m fine,” Arthur grits his teeth, forcing himself to actuality meet Lewis’s gaze. It’s a mix of confused, hurt and frustrated.  

“No. You’re not  _fine_ ,” Lewis snaps, “What part of that was  _fine_. This is about more than being distracted by a new project or a fear of supernatural things, which you’ve never mentioned before this week.”

“It’s me, isn’t it? I’ve done something wrong. You’re mad at me.”

“No. I’m not. I…” He starts trying to deny the accusation then stops because his brain is still badly jumbled and not giving him anything to say in his defence. The opportunity to deny passes. His failure to respond is damning.

“You can barely stay in a room with me,” Lewis continues, sounding just about as devastated as Arthur now feels, “We haven’t had a proper conversation in almost two weeks. You’re my best friend!”

“Lewis,” Vivi stands abruptly, putting a hand on Lewis’s chest, “You need to back up and take a moment. We can talk about this later.”

“I’m not mad! That’s not it.” Arthur talks desperately over Vivi, struggling to his feet, still pressed back against the door. If he could sink into the wood, he would.

“You hate me!” Lewis is almost yelling, “What did I do wrong!?”

“No. I would never… I,” Arthur tries to dispute the claim, but Lewis takes a deliberate step forward, and Arthur flinches before he can stop himself. Lewis’s expression turns to one of absolute desolation like he’s just confirmed one of his worse fears.

“Lewis,” Vivi snaps, shoving Lewis. The taller man stumbles back, appearing stunned and a little guilty. Arthur opens his mouth to continue arguing but Vivi holds out a hand, silencing him.

“No.” She declares, slightly strained, “We’re all going to take deep breaths, stop throwing around accusations,” A frown at Lewis, “And have a calm discussion.”

Silence follows her order. Arthur shuffles uncomfortably and Lewis roles his shoulders, stepping away and letting out a deliberately long exhale. Vivi sighs and lowers her arms, turning to Arthur.

“Arthur…I…are you okay?” She sounds confused, and Arthur feels increasing levels terrible.

“Yeah, …sort of,” He hesitates, lifts his left hand and runs it through his hair in agitation, adding, “Not really?”

She nodes, “What do you need?”

“I just need…” to time travel back to half an hour ago and fix all of this, “A few seconds of fresh air. Alone.” He needs time to think and process. He can’t do that with Lewis right there, believing Arthur hated him.

“A swear I’ll answer any questions after. I just need a few seconds.” His hand grasps for the door handle and the brief relief it offered. Vivi watches like she wants to ask more questions, reaching and making an aborted attempt at taking his hand in a show of comfort.

“Okay. Take your time…but, Arthur, please, this isn’t…. I’m really worried. We both care about you, we really do,” A long pause. Vivi’s upset. He’s upset Vivi. Arthur just nods curtly, reversing out the door. The last thing he sees is Vivi turning back to slumped Lewis, hands on her hips like she’s about to deliver a lecture.

Outside, Arthur takes a shaky breath, studying the two additional cars in the motel lot with vacant eyes. The sun has risen higher in the sky but its warmth is a false comfort. What the hell is he supposed to do now? What can he possibly say to explain this?

Lewis thinks Arthur hates him. How does he tell this Lewis that it isn’t him he has a problem with but his future dead counterpart who’d decided to violently murder him? How is that better? Both of Arthur’s hands are now gripping at strands of hair, pulling in agitation. Would they even believe him if he did? Lewis had seemed so hurt, so sure of his conclusion. What would he think of Arthur if he came in with a story about time travel, ghosts, giant foxes and mysterious caves? It was entirely unbelievable.

Maybe, if Mystery backed him up… 

Arthur rubs his eyes with a shaky hand. If he told them the truth, and they believed him, then they’d know that Lewis had died. That the reason he’s been avoiding Lewis was because the other man had killed him.  _Why did you do it Lewis?_

Arthur still doesn’t know why. No one knew, or would ever know, why. He’s scared, terrified that that information, information about a future which never happened, would drag everyone down into his misery.  

Vibrations from the phone in his pant pocket catch attention, offering a welcome distraction from his turbulent thoughts. Arthur reaches to answer it. It’s Darrel, his uncle’s workshop assistant, and Arthur frowns at the user ID. They weren’t practically close, and he can’t think of a good reason for him to be calling. He notes that he’s also missed three other calls, two more from Darrel and one from an unknown number.

Arthur hits accept, greeting in a tired voice, “Hey Darrel. What’s up.”

“Arthur! Finally. I thought you might be out of range. Thank god you aren’t. I’ve got some bad news for you dude so you might want to sit down.”

“Bad news?” Arthur’s stomach sinks.

Darrel continues, stressed and frazzled, “It’s Lance, man. He was attacked! I found him this morning, the police were here and everything. He’s on his way to St Peter’s Hospital in an ambulance. Dude, I know you’re on a road trip, but you might want to come back cause he was pretty bad…”

“Wait. Wait.” Arthur interrupts Darrel’s panicky sentences, “Attacked? What do you mean he’s on his way to the hospital?”

“I don’t know what to tell you, man. He’s in bad shape. I arrived at work, on time like always, and he was bleeding out all over the floor. Of course, I called an ambulance straight away, who wouldn’t, but I don’t know dude it looked really serious…”

Darrel’s rambling washes over him, sounding from further and further away until the other’s voice is muffled in the distance. This isn’t right. This hadn’t happened in his original timeline. Did he do this? Arthur’s thoughts spin like a pinwheel, searching in vain for a connection. Beside him, the door, separating him from Lewis and Vivi, looms. His gaze slides over its wooden surface. Vivi and Lewis are waiting. They’re waiting for the truth.

“Arthur,”

The sound of his name snaps his focus back to Darrel.  

“Ye…Yeah?”

“You okay there man, you went quiet for a second,”

“Yeah. I’m…I’m fine. This is fine,” Arthur moves towards his van, hesitating to look at the motel room again.

Darrel is quiet, “If you say so. Look, I’ll be turning off the highway soon, so I’m going to have to hang up, but I’ll give you a call as soon as I know more.”

“Thanks, yeah, that sounds good.” Arthur reaches the van, “I’ll start driving back now so I should be there in about eight hours.”

“Sure dude. Let me know when you’re close. Okay?”

“I will. See you soon…” Arthur mutters.

The phone goes dead, and Arthur stares at its darkened screen. His other hand rests on the van door, frozen in indecision. He can’t just leave Lewis and Vivi here. Not without telling them  _something_. Arthur turns stiffly, eye’s moving past the motel rooms to land on the box-shaped reception block. Unsteadily, he hurries over, getting blasted with chilled air-conditioning when he opens the sliding door.

He is greeted by the same disinterested women from the previous night. She’s reading and doesn’t acknowledge his entrance.

“Um, excuse me,”

“What do you want?” The board woman responds without looking up.

“Can I borrow a pen and paper,” He points distractedly at the stack on the edge of her desk.

“Whatever.”

Arthur quickly pens a message, hoping Vivi and Lewis don’t hate him for doing this.

“Ah,” He glances at the woman, “Are there any buses which stop in this town?”

“The Interstate Line stops here and in most towns between here and the border. They come through early, 6am, every day.”

“Thanks,” Arthur mumbles. Vivi and Lewis would have a way to get home then. They would just have to wait until tomorrow.

He hesitates again before leaving, “If the people in room 11 come to check out can you give them this message?”

Finally, the lady looks up, squinting at the piece of paper, levelling an annoyed glare at Arthur, “Leave it there. If they come in, I’ll tell’em you wrote it,”

Arthur waverers in guilty indecision, carefully folding the paper and placing it at the edge of the desk. The woman returns to reading. One final second of guilt and Arthur hurries out of the reception and back to his van.

This isn’t running away…he’ll tell them the truth once he knows his Uncle is okay. Maybe, they’ll hate him, but they’re sure to be better off without him around anyway so perhaps it doesn’t matter.

He’s back on the highway, heading in the direction of home before he can think to change his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because I’ve had someone asking about this I’m just going to remind people that I do post these on Tumblr before Ao3 (though they’ve seen a little less editing). This chapter matches up with [this](http://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/182704967947/msa-time-travel-idea-part-18)


	13. Counting down to Zero 1

Arthur drives continuously until he’s forced to stop for fuel. At a small roadside gas station, he grabs a breakfast bar, loads up on five-hour energy shots and uses a cramped, single-stall restroom in a brief attempt at freshening up. All his clean clothing is in his backpack, which he’s left in the motel room. Luckily, his washed-out apricot shirt and orange shorts double as daywear and aren’t too worn.

Back on the road  Arthur carefully keeps his mind blank, listening absently to the radio chatter and fixating on the way stretching ahead. He deliberately doesn’t think about Vivi and Lewis, resolutely ignoring the occasional buzzing of his phone, which starts seconds after his departure and continues at odd intervals throughout the day.

He wishes he could switch it off, but he needs to receive calls from Darrel, who’s been worryingly silent so far.  Thus, he’s stuck feeling guilty every time the screen lights up with an incoming call or text message. If only Vivi and Lewis would give up and decide to enjoy their time together without him. Unfortunately, his friends worry an awful lot, and he suspects that abandoning them in some middle-of-nowhere town wasn’t going to help.

Maybe, when he explains a few things, stuff will get better. If Vivi and Lewis still want to be around him. He’s still on the fence about telling them to whole truth but, at this point, it’s either that or invent some entirely new lie. Arthur’s so sick of lying. Honestly, he would rather spend eternity alone in his room- and not interact with anyone -then keep up this charade. But…no use obsessing about the future now. There will be plenty of time to figure out how he’s going to explain everything- and panic about how he’s somehow messed up the timeline - once he’s seen Lance alive and well.

Unlike the trip out, where they had lost multiple hours to rest stops, Arthur makes good time -if you could call eight hours, good time-and approaches his destination both sooner and slower than he would have liked. With one hand strangling the wheel, Arthur finally builds the courage needed to reach for his phone. There’s still been no news from Darrel, which he hopes is a good sign. At the next red light, he dials while scanning road signs for the correct exit. Nervously, he drums his fingers to the soft beat of some unfamiliar song on the radio.

Darrel answers almost immediately so Arthur is saved from waiting too long.

“Yo Arthur, was about to call, where are you man,” the other man says, sounding oddly upbeat, considering the situation.

Arthur ignores the question, quickly asking, “How’s Uncle Lance? Is he okay? What’s happening?” All that stress and anxiety he’s been neglecting is now front and centre.

“Whoa,” Darrel cuts him off,  “Yeah, I was about to say. He’s in surgery, and so far there’s been no word. Like, the nurses said they were mainly concerned about blood loss. He was hooked up to a needle, like, straight away, but we waited a few hours for the surgery, so I guess that means there was no really serious internal damage.”

Arthur winces, blood loss was something he was intimately familiar with, “Anything else?”

“Both his legs had a few hairline fractures, a broken bone here and there, and the doctors mentioned surface stab wounds,” Darrel adds after a moment of thought. The other man sounds a lot calmer when compared to his almost panic on the phone earlier that morning. Arthur takes the change as a good sign.

“Right…” Arthur exhales a long breath. His Uncle isn’t dying. The guilt he has been carrying since leaving Vivi and Lewis still pulls at his chest and stomach, but at least things with Lance aren’t as dire as they could be. It’s still bad, but maybe he’ll get out of this not having somehow caused his Uncle’s death.

“So, you said you were driving down, how far off are you?” Darrel asks after his elongated pause.

“Ah, sorry, I’m about twenty minutes out.”

“Jeez, that’s close,” Darrel remarks, surprised, “How about I meet you in the car park near the emergency ward, it’s the first turn off the main…”

“I know where it is,” He reassures, stifling a yawn. Despite multiple energy shots, he’s really feeling the strain of the last twenty-four hours, “and yeah…that sounds good.”

“You want me to get you a coffee or something dude? Cause I guess you haven’t eaten yet,”

“Coffee sounds be pretty good right about now. Thanks….Darrel.” Arthur doesn’t know what he would have done had Darrel not found his Uncle when he did.

“No problemo. Not much to do except wait for the doctors to say something. I’ll tell you more in person when you get here.”

“Yeah. Okay. Sounds good.”

Darrel hangs up, and Arthur tosses his phone back into the front passenger seat releasing a tired sigh.  He focuses again on the road, navigating the busy streets leading into the town’s moderately sized business district. By now he knows the way to the St Peter’s Medical and Emergency Centre off by heart. His stomach is doing small flips, churning in a mixture of nerves, fear and anxiety. If he had never stepped foot in that building again, it would have still been too soon. All his memories of the place are linked with Lewis’s disappearance, a long and painful rebab, multiple surgeries, and Vivi’s inexplicable amnesia.

Unsurprisingly, it ends up being just as unappealing as he remembers. Dull grey, utilitarian, and accompanied by an impending sense of dread. Arthur ignores his instinctive need to turn and drive in the opposite direction, locating the entry to the correct car pack. It’s a small underground lot, consisting of visitor and employee parking, situated near the  Emergency Centre portion of the building.

Arthur squints when he transitions from daylight to the carpark’s dime fluorescence. The layout is such that he has to drive past the main entrance giving access to the hospital. True to word, he spots Darrel next to the collection of elevators and staircases, casually leaning against a concrete support structure, coffee in hand. Fortunately, he doesn’t have to look far for an empty park, finding one several cars down. Arthur exits his van a bundle of jumpy, nervous energy, fidgeting and smoothing down his wrinkled shirt as he goes. He feels he can probably get away with wearing it into the hospital. It’s only seen one night of wear.

“Hey Arthur,” Darrel strolls up, giving a small wave, “How are you holding up?”

“Tired from the drive,”  Arthur admits, crossing over through deserted carpark towards the other man, “How’s Uncle Lance?”

“Still in surgery last I checked,” Darrel causally shrugs. All his urgency and stress is gone to be replaced with an almost board disposition. Arthur hesitates, slightly thrown by oddly discordant temperament.

“You talked to one of the triage nurses, right?” He shakes off the uncertainty, letting worry for his Uncle occupy his full attention, “What did they say exactly. Come on, you can fill me in on the way up to…”

Arthur doesn’t get more than partway into the sentence when Darrel, who’s in the process of handing him a coffee, stumbles. The coffee spills across his shirt, splattering across his shoulder. Arthur registers the discomfort of hot liquid and Darrel’s half-hearted apology before the other man leans in and grips both sides of his head. Arthur tries to flinch away at the unexpected proximity. Their eyes meet.

Green.

The colour is bright. Familiar. An intangible force seams to wrap about his limbs, tangling itself up in his mind, pulling him down. For a second Arthur is…

_…walking down a gloomy stone tunnel. Torchlight flickers, illuminating the figure of Lewis up ahead. Lewis steps out into a spacious cavern, holding the flaming torch aloft. Arthur trips on uneven rock, hand brushing against the cave walls. Pain shoots up his limb, and he stops, staring at the appendage, confused. Had he cut himself?_

_“Hey, Arthur! Come check out this view!” Lewis’s call distracts him…_

Arthur tries to draw breath, preparing for a panic response, but a wall comes down like a guillotine, separating him from the physical reaction he’s expecting. His chest constricts, and there is the buzz of adrenalin getting dumped into his system, prepping him for fight or flight. Usually, this was when he’d start breathing hard, maybe hyperventilating, but he’s been cut adrift from his body, so the onslaught comes to an abrupt halt. Of course, he still panics, but it’s a mental, internal panic, accompanied by overwhelming dread and fear.

Darrel, who has let go of Arthur’s head, stumbles back, collapsing to the ground like he’s a puppet and someone’s cut the strings. Arthur raises a hand, wiggling his fingers, rolling his shoulders and inhaling. The breathless, tight sensation immediately evaporates.

“Finally,” He breaths out and Arthur realises with growing horror that it’s not him who’s doing the talking. Muscles along his arms and legs spasm experimentally also beyond his control.  

_No. No. No. This isn’t him! It’s not him!_  Why is this so familiar?! Memories, long buried, both familiar and foreign, vie for his attention.

_…“Hey Arthur! Come check out this view!” Lewis’s call distracts him._

_His arm is numb now, but Arthur finds himself unfocussed, mesmerised by the patterns of light which are catching on the green, mossy walls and sharp stalagmites far below. He and Lewis are standing on a ledge overlooking a steep drop…_

“Oh god,” Darrel’s panicky voice draws his attention. The other man is scrambling back along the ground, shaking in fear. He’s scared of Arthur.

“Jesus. Oh, God!”

“Nope. No God here,” Arthur’s body comments, fixing its attention on the other man.

Darrel attempts to stand.

“Oh no. I’m not letting you go as well. Not this time,” Arthur growls, sweeping out a leg, knocking Darrel to the ground. Calmly, he walks around, stumbling briefly when one of his thigh muscles twitch suddenly. Despite this falter he still manages to kick Darrel over again, preventing him from escaping.

“Look, dude,” Darrel holds out his hands in a gesture of surrender, twisting around on his back, “I’ll give you anything. I won’t tell anyone. I swear. Just let me go. Please. I have a family man.”

“No you don’t,” Arthur scoffs, lashing out, and stomping down simultaneously. Darrel’s head connects with the concrete giving a loud thunk. The other man falls silent and still. Disturbingly, Arthur feels his body and eyes scan the empty lot, shivering with obvious pleasure. There is no one around to stop him. Internally, Arthur claws mentally at his surroundings, flailing about, attempting to find a hold where there is none.  _It’s not him. It wasn’t him!_

“That’s more like it,” His body talks. Arthur freezes in his panic, very aware of an increasingly overwhelming pressure focusing in upon him.

“Now, before I go dump poor Darrel somewhere, let’s take a quick look at what we have. It’s been a real run around getting you, so you better hope there’s something worthwhile banging around up here.”

Memories of the last few days unravel like an old film reel, spiralling past without his consent. Like a movie permanently fixed in fast forward they rush by. Arthur feels flashes of emotion as the scenes come and go quicker than he can register.

It all comes to an abrupt halt when it hits the moment he awoke in the past. Where Arthur transitioned between falling off a cliff to waking in his bed.

“Impossible,” The thing that’s not him mutters with his mouth.

“That’s not possible,” It sounds agitated, almost angry. The foreign presence winds its way deeper into his thoughts, pulling them apart. The flashing images start up again.

“Someone’s been breaking The Rules,”  Is the last Arthur hears before he’s lost in a sea of panic and memories. This isn’t right.

He’s made a mistake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to Tumblr version [here](http://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/182887367812/msa-time-travel-idea-part-19)


	14. Counting down to Zero (Lewis)

_“No. I would never… I,” Arthur starts explaining, hesitating to  stutter. He’s going to lie like he’s been doing the last two weeks. It’s not enough. Lewis wants, needs, the truth. He takes a deliberate, almost aggressive, step forward, and Arthur flinches back and away. There is nothing but fear and confusion. Not the hate he expected. Fear. Arthur’s scare of him._  

_Why? What did he do wrong?_

“What was that?” Vivi’s loud question draws him from the turbulent realisations swirling painfully about his brain. Lewis glances up from where he’s been tracing the floral patterns on the carpet. The hotel seems overly stuffy after his and Arthur’s disagreement. If you could call it a disagreement.

Vivi is standing, hands on her hips, visibly unimpressed.

“I messed up,” Lewis answers, scowling down again. Because, as much as he had wanted answers, yelling accusations at a disorientated Arthur was not something a friend did. He  _should_  have waited for Arthur to calm down and collect himself. Instead, Lewis had deliberately tried to provoke a reaction, confirming that Arthur was terrified of him and managing to feel like garbage all at once. His friend’s terrified expression is burned at the forefront of his mind.

“…He was scared Viv. Really scared. It’s not hate…He’s scared.”

“Lewis…” Vivi’s tone loses some of its heat, becoming soft like she’s going to try and console him.

“No,” Lewis snaps, “You saw it. He was scared. And he’s probably  _terrified_  now that I…” He motions angrily at nothing.

 Lewis is a big guy, he’s used to making people nervous. Usually, all it takes is a bit of common courtesy, polite mannerism, and some kind words for people to warm up to him. Never, not in a million years, had he anticipated the same level of hesitation and caution from Arthur. And he’s given it time like Vivi suggested. Waited almost two weeks. Arthur simply refused to interact with him, blocking all his attempts at reconciling. Now Lewis has gone and ruined his chances at fixing things.  _What was he supposed to do now?_

“Stop that.”

A sharp poke in the shoulder breaks the flustered spiral of negative thought. Lewis glares. Vivi’s now sitting on the adjacent bed opposite him. Their knees are touching. She pulls back from her poke, stating, “You face is going to freeze if you frown for much longer.”

She waves away his incoming objections, grimacing as she does, “I don’t think that was a good indicator of whether Arthur is afraid or hates you. He was panicking…” She trails off then continues, stronger, “I think we should wait until Arthur’s in a better place to explain before jumping to conclusions.”

Lewis breaks eye contact, feeling a renewed sense of guilt. If his mama were here, she’d be equally unimpressed.

“I could have gone about that a lot better…”

Vivi nodes genuinely and Lewis winces, continuing, “But, I mean, you’ve noticed how he’s been avoiding me this last week.”

“Both of us. Not just you,” Vivi starts, and Lewis cuts her off.

“Arthur’s fine with you. More than fine even. Whenever you’re around, he’s at ease, less jumpy. I kind of thought he was jealous of us, but he always insists we do stuff together, so that’s not it.”

Vivi is silent, considering his statement.

Frustration, with his failure to adequately describe the situation or find a way to talk things out calmly before shit hit the fan, drives him on. Lewis continues, “When he’s around me he’s always looking down at his feet or flinching or finding an excuse to leave the room. I tried giving it time, but it’s been a week now. I must have done something because why else would he be acting like this.”

The fear in Arthur’s eyes wasn’t something he’s going to forget in a hurry. It was a look reserved for a monster. He’s not a monster.  _Was he?_

“But what have you done? I mean, I haven’t noticed a change.” Vivi’s not even denying it now, and it doesn’t make Lewis feel any better.

“That’s just it. I don’t know. I haven’t done anything to spark a change like this. Or, at least, I don’t think I have...”

“Then it can’t be you, can it.” Vivi says frankly.

“What? No. Are you even listening? He was scared of me Viv, terrified, you saw it!”

Vivi huffs, tired but determined, “I’m not saying that he wasn’t scared…just that, maybe, it’s something else. If you’ve been acting how you always act, and done nothing differently, then there is obviously another variable at play here. His fear of you is just a correlation. The cause must be related to something else.”

Lewis ignores Vivi’s logic in favour of muttering,  “What if he thinks I forced him to come on this road trip? Is Arthur scared of road trips? Maybe he thinks, I don’t know, I’ll beat him up or something if he makes me mad.”

Vivi pokes him hard in the cheek this time, “We planned the road trip as a trio and, as soon as we knew Arthur had an aversion to supernatural things, we changed it. If anything, he would be avoiding me. I’m the one who’s been obsessing over it for the last mouth, lugging those books around everywhere. Also, Lewis, you haven’t thrown a punch since high school, and that was in Arthur’s defence, so I don’t think that’s it.”

There’s a contemplative silence and both he and Vivi turn to stare at the motel door in unison. He wants to believe Vivi, but his heart still aches, replaying the moment Arthur violently threw himself to the floor to escape him. Terrified. If it’s not something Lewis has done wrong, then how is he supposed to fix it?

“Mystery,” Vivi comments, half lost in thought. The dog perks up from his curled position on the bed, and Vivi looks apologetic before turning to Lewis, “Arthur’s been avoiding Mystery as well. Like, I thought it was odd, he hasn’t pet Mystery once in the last two weeks. Then there’s his forgetfulness as well. It’s been really obtrusive lately. I was going to bring it up once we had settled into the road a bit more.”

Lewis examines the small dog. He had noticed Arthur being a lot less friendly towards the Mystery. It just hadn’t been a top concern of his.

“But what’s the link between all that?”

“I don’t know. But I bet there is one,” Vivi declares before deflating, adding quietly, “I thought it was the supernatural stuff. I wanted it to be the supernatural stuff cause that’s an easy fix. But it’s not that. I should have tried harder to get better answers.”

Silence.

“I haven’t seen him panic that bad since his dad tried to run off with him,” She sighs, fiddling with her sleeve, “Sorry I didn’t believe you when you brought this up a week ago…”

Vivi sounds lost, and Lewis feels even worse for letting his emotions get the better of him.

He takes her hand, “It’s okay…I mean…you know Arthur’s super suborn when he wants to be. And I do tend to overreact emotionally on occasion.”

She smiles that warm smile he loves.

“Only sometimes…” She teases lightly. The warmth lasts for a second before fading back to worry and concern. Lewis glances back towards the door.

“When he comes back in…I think you should ask all the questions. Maybe I’ll leave the room. If I’m somehow triggering whatever is scaring Arthur, then it’s better if I’m not around for the questioning.” Also, though he’s feeling calmer now, he doesn’t think he can handle Arthur looking at him like that again without breaking down himself.

Vivi nodes unhappily before straightening, confidence growing again as she pushes past her momentary falter.

“We’ll stay in this ugly motel for the next month if we have to,” She asserts, “Eventually Arthur will have to tell us the truth, even if it’s simply because there’s no high-speed internet out here.”

Lewis lets a small smile tug at his lips. Any further planning is interrupted by Mystery who abruptly stands, darting towards the door and barking loudly. Before either of them can address the uncharacteristic behaviour, they hear the rumble of a familiar engine starting up. Lewis and Vivi share a glance, instantly reaching the same conclusion.

Vivi is at the door, retching it open a second later, Lewis at her back. They tumble out onto the pavement just in time to see the back end of Arthur’s van turn onto the main road. That doesn’t stop Vivi from chasing after it. She sprints off across the concrete, yelling Arthur’s name.  Lewis remains still, tracking the van as it speeds back the way they’d come, leaving Vivi to eat dust. Immediately, Lewis pulls out his phone, flicking through his contacts and holding it anxiously to his ear. It rings for several long seconds and goes to Arthur’s voice mail. He curses, slowly lowering his arm.

Vivi’s trudges back towards him, furiously tapping away at her own phone.

“He’s not answering!” She’s visibly unhappy, more then she had been seconds ago, “He said he’d answer our questions. Now he’s driving off god knows where. Do you think he’ll come back?”

Lewis looks back towards the main road, heart sinking. Morning sunlight is reflecting off car windows as they zip by. Across from the motel is a gas station and another equally dilapidated building. This pattern repeats a short way down before the buildings drop off to be replaced by empty flatland. He doesn’t think Arthur’s coming back. What if it’s because Lewis has scared him off. Because he couldn’t hold his temper for two seconds!

Vivi interprets his silence as the negative it is, snapping a frustrated, “Why though? Why would he leave so suddenly.”

She begins to pace back and forth, trying to answer her own questions, “If he says he’s going to stay, why would he leave without telling us? Unless he  _can’ t_ tell us. Something  _really_  bad maybe…but what? What aren’t you telling us, Arthur? Damn it. Why?”

Lewis feels his throat closing up like he’s inhaled a sharp lump.

“No. Don’t you start again,” Vivi states before he can say anything disparaging about himself, “This isn’t your fault. Got it.”

Abruptly, she turns and stomps back to the motel room. Lewis swallows, looking down at Mystery who offers him a confused lopsided stare, before following behind.  When he enters the room, Vivi is on the floor, pulling apart Arthur’s bag.

“What are you doing?” Lewis hesitates in the door.

“There’s got to be something,” Vivi says while focused on the bag. Lewis is leerily about going through Arthur’s stuff knowing how private the other man is. A worried Vivi has no such qualms.

“He’s left his laptop. He never goes anywhere without his laptop,” She mutters, throwing Arthur’s clothes across the ground in her hurry.

She pulls up a small plastic bottle and shakes. It rattles.

“Did know he was taking these again?”

“Anxiety medication?” He questions, squinting at the script on the bottle’s side. He shakes his head mutely. It’s dated to last week. Lewis bets, if he doubled checked, it would match up to the day Arthur went on his mysterious shopping trip. Vivi pulls out several pieces of loose paper, rifling through them, pausing when one catches her attention. Wordlessly, she holds it up to Lewis.

It’s a referral to a psychologist dated to the same day as the pills.

“Why? Why wouldn’t he tell us?” Vivi asks, and Lewis has nothing to alleviate her worry. All he knows for sure is, whatever is wrong, it’s making Arthur scared of him. Now Arthur’s gone, and he can’t even apologise.

“Something’s not right,” Vivi mumbles to herself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to Tumblr version [here](http://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/183016070577/msa-time-travel-idea-part-20)


	15. Counting down to Zero 2

_“We’ll be fine,” Vivi reassures Arthur for a third time, spinning to face him, backing up past the assortment of haphazardly constructed ‘keep out’ and ‘danger!’ signage. Behind her looms the cave’s gaping entrance._

 

_“We’ve been through a ton of caves. The worst thing that could happen? We, maybe, get swarmed by some bats,” She continues upon seeing Arthur’s continued hesitation._

 

_“Ah, how about a cave in?” He points out leerily, eyeing jagged stone formations framing the entryway._

_“No seismic activity in the area, I checked,” Vivi declares, whirling to march forward, glancing back to call, “You boys coming or what.”_

 

_Mystery bounds off after Vivi, leaving him to shoot an apprehensive glance at Lewis. The larger man shrugs, putting a comforting hand across Arthur’s shoulder blades, “If this has you really worried we can always wait out here while Vivi takes her supernatural readings.”_

 

_Arthur sighs, tempted to take him up on offer, “No. It’s fine. Probably best not to let Vivi go spelunking with only Mystery as back up.”_

 

_“Probably,” Lewis laughs, patting his shoulder once then stepping forward, “Just stick behind me. I’m sure this will be just as boring as all the other caves we’ve walked through.”_

 

_“Yeah. ‘Boring’…Sure. That’s not the word I’d use but, whatever, let’s go with boring,” Arthur grumbles, shadowing Lewis up to the entrance. The ground underfoot transitions sharply from spotted green to dead twigs and dusty rock._

 

_“Creepy,” Arthur eyes the unnaturally straight line, cutting the cave off from its surroundings. Lewis snorts, amused by his muttering-at least someone is having a good time-walking into the dark like this isn’t the most unnerving place they’ve been to so far. Just inside the dimly lit opening, he spots Vivi, who’s wrestling with a wrought iron canister holding what appeared to be old-style wooden torches._

 

_“Hey guys, check these out! Mood lighting! ” She calls with apparent gusto. Better make that two people having a good time._

 

_“Lewis. You still have those matches on you, right? I think there’s still oil on these.”_

 

_Lewis trades his box of matches for the wooden torch, holding it out while Vivi grapples around, attempting to light it. Arthur is surprised the old torch has lasted this long. They can’t be  the only ones dumb enough to explore a ‘haunted’ cave at night. Surely, some other idiot would have used them up before now._

 

_“Can’t we just use the flashlights?” Arthur comments in conjunction with Vivi’s resounding “YES” of triumph. The stone walls around them come to life with a flickering orange glow. High, arched ceilings, almost two stories tall, provide an abundance of space. Arthur can now see several meters down a long tunnel before darkness overtakes it again. He shivers, peering at the many cracks and holes dotting the roof and walls. Everything is coated in a thin layer of green moss which catches the torchlight, giving a green tint. In other words, it looks freaky and unnatural._

 

_“Well, this just went up several points on the Creepy-O-Meter,” He bemoans, resigning himself to an evening of jumping at pebbles coming loose from the ceiling, gusts of wind, and his own shadow._

_“I know! It’s great isn’t it?” Vivi twists, grinning ridiculously, now holding a torch in each hand._

_“Watch where you wave those Viv,” Lewis dodges back and avoids a face full of fire, reaching out and plucking the nearest torch from Vivi, “You almost got my hair with that one.”_

 

_“Whoops sorry,” A sheepish Vivi shoots Lewis an apologetic glance before carefully lifting her remaining torch to get a better look at the cavernous structures around them. A few seconds of fascinated gawking pass, while both his friends take in their strange new environment._

 

_“You have to admit, this is a lot cooler than a graveyard or an old house,” Vivi voices in awe, moving deeper into the tunnel. She’s got an energetic spring to her step mirrored by Mystery trotting at her heels.  No attention is afforded to the spooky shadows, shrinking away from the torchlight, rushing to close in behind them. It’s admirable._

 

_“Maybe there’ll be an actual ghost this time and not a dude playing dress up?” Lewis adds, glancing about, holding his torch higher, “Definitely has the ambience for it.”_

 

_Arthur shuffles closer to Vivi, so he’s sandwiched between the two of them. This way he’ll have plenty of warning when the freaky cave monster leaps out to get them._

 

_“One can only hope,” Vivi laments loudly. Her voice echoes, bouncing along the slimy green walls until it’s swallowed up by the dark. Arthur shudders. Is it just him or does it feel like the cave is listening?_

_“Ah. Objection,” He interjects, lowering his voice, so it doesn’t jump around like Vivi’s, “A dude in a sheet is plenty scary, thanks. No need for anything esle.”_

 

_Lewis laughs from behind, also lowering his voice to a whisper, “Like weird-scary or scary-scary?”_

_Arthur throws a half-serious glare over his shoulder, retorting, “Both.”_

 

_Further conversation is put on pause when they hit a fork in the otherwise straight tunnel. The two passageways are significantly smaller, a foot higher than Lewis, and narrow, twisting away from the central shaft. Both are equally uninviting, ghostly, glowing a poisonous green in the torchlight. His shadowed silhouette, elongated in the firelight, appears to shift unnaturally, skittering away into the gloom. Arthur blinks, focusing attention on the spot. There’s nothing there but ordinary rock._

 

_“Let’s split up,” Vivi’s announcement draws Arthur’s concentration away from studying the walls for shadow creatures._

 

_“What?”_

 

_Lewis is nodding along, considering both passageways seriously._

 

_“No way,” Arthur waves his arms to catch their attention, wincing at his own volume, then whispering, “Splitting up is a terrible idea. When has splitting up ever worked well for anyone.”_

 

_“If we split up we’ll cover more ground and get through the cave system faster,” Vivi points out, already searching through her small rucksack._

 

_“Just remember to take lots of photos. Here have my spare EMF meter,” She shoves the ‘totally legit’ ghost detection devise, an audio recorder, and notepad into Lewis’s free hand, “Don’t forget to actually press record this time when stuff happens, and write a note, so we know to cross check it later.”_

 

_“Sure,” Lewis pockets the equipment with a laugh,_

 

_Arthur slaps a hand over his eyes, groaning. Why are his friends a pair of walking clichés?_

 

_“Lewis. You go with Arthur. He’ll need the moral support more than I will.”_

 

_“Hey,” His protest is half-hearted._

 

_“I’ll take Mystery down that tunnel. Let’s meet up in, say, an hour and report our findings.”_

 

_Vivi walks purposefully forward before pausing to add, “Oh and if it gets too maze-like come back here, so you don’t get lost,” Another step, “And don’t fall down any holes.”_

 

_“We’ll be fine,” Lewis reassures, amused, slinging an arm out and catching Arthur before he can duck away, “Arthur’s got my back.”_

 

_Arthur suffers the semi-headlock with crossed arms and a stony expression. It’s not that he really believes they’ll run into trouble it’s more a matter of principle at this point. All it does is make Vivi snort in good humour then hide a grin behind her hand._

 

_“See you boys in an hour,” A cheery wave and Vivi marches away, looking for all the world like a person having the time of their life._

 

_“You okay there Arthur,” Lewis loosens his arm, glancing down. There is genuine concern in his tone now, eyes scanning Arthur for signs of discomfort. Arthur forcibly shelves his exasperation. No need to bring down the mood. Not when this is the first time in weeks he’s been exclusively in either Lewis or Vivi’s company._

 

_A long exhale, and he ducks to disentangle himself from the larger man’s arm,  “Yeah. Come on. Let’s go poke around a dark, damp, tunnel some more.” He injects as much enthusiasm as he can muster, but it ends up more sarcastic._

 

_Lewis hits him with a knowing smile, offering, “Here I’ll go first.”_

 

_His friend takes a confident step forward, holding the torch high to provide them with maximum visibility. Arthur follows close behind, trying not to get too freaked out at the way the cave walls seem to shift unnaturally in the uneven light. It’s just his overactive mind seeing familiar patterns where there were none. That was all._

_Down the gloomy stone tunnel, they go, flickering fire illuminating Lewis’s silhouette and the narrow walls enclosing them. Nervously, Arthur picks up his pace, tailing as close to Lewis’s back as he can get. Occasionally, he bumps into the other man when Lewis stops abruptly to examine part to the scenery. Lewis doesn’t appear to mind, being more interested in sporadic wooden support beams which arise from time to time. Everything is pretty much identical until the narrow tunnel opens suddenly to reveal a spacious cavern. It’s huge. Dotted with wicked sharp stalagmites and stalactites which both hang from the ceiling and raise up from the ground like clawed fingers, it dwarfs them both._

_Lewis immediately steps out of the tunnel onto a narrow ledge extending into empty space, transfixed by the stunning view. Arthur makes to follow. Distracted, he stumbles, hand brushing against the cave walls for support. Pain shoots through the limb, and Arthur stops, staring at the appendage, confused._

_Had he cut himself? He doesn’t appear to be injured._

 

_“Hey, Arthur! Come check out this view!”_

 

_Lewis is now standing near the end of the wedge-shaped platform, peering down at the steep drop. Cautiously, Arthur inches out after him, eyeing the pointed rock formations far below.  The way they catch and reflect the torchlight is almost menacing._

 

_Would be such a shame if someone were to fall. The thought arrives then vanishes just as quickly._

 

_His left leg twitches, and he almost stumbles right into Lewis. Arthur finds himself unfocussed, and he hesitates behind the larger man. What is he doing again? Why is Lewis so close all of a sudden?_

_His arm is completely numb. It’s tuned an unnatural sickly green colour. The same colour as the walls. That’s not normal. A twitch. Arthur watches, confused when his limb jerks up. A second too late he realises that he’s not the one moving it. In an action almost too quick to follow the arm lashes out._

_“Lew…” The words of warning are choked off. Lewis turns, too slow to prevent the shove but quick enough that Arthur sees his shocked, betrayed expression. Lewis tumbles backward, face frozen in confusion._

 

_A surprised yell._

 

_Gravity rips Lewis from where he seems to hover mid-air, dragging him down._

 

_He drops._

 

_His friend’s panicked horror is the last of him Arthur sees. A wet thump. The yell is cut abruptly._

 

_Silence._

 

_“Ouch. Right through the chest. That’s never fun,” The foreign words vibrate in Arthur’s chest, accompanied by an unpleasant laugh._

 

_Down, far below on the cavern floor, is Lewis. Unmoving. Arthur wants to scream. He needs to scream, but his jaw is locked shut. Part of his vision goes dark. With his remaining good eye, he can see his arm moving, squirming about like it’s got a mind of its own._

 

_No. No. No. This isn’t him.  IT’S NOT HIM!!!_

 

_A jaw filled with rows of shiny white teeth clamps down on the writhing appendage. A flash of bright red. His arm is twisting, being ripped away. The force of the impact spins him around, putting him face-to-face with a giant canine creature. Red. There’s lots of red. His vision is failing. A warm haze gathers over his thoughts, mercifully pulling him from reality._

 

_“Ah Shit,” He hears himself swear over the oppressive throbbing in his head and the growls of the monster above._

**“…And STOP…”**

The world freezes. Arthur freezes. It’s like someone’s hit the pause button on reality. Suspended, frozen halfway between falling to his knees and standing, Arthur hangs in place. Vaguely, he recognises Mystery looming over him, also frozen, green-hued arm between his teeth. Arthur’s disembodied arm.

“Sloppy. Very sloppy.”

The voice doesn’t echo like sound should in this stone, cavernous environment. It’s detached. Footsteps dull and artificial, mismatched on the rock floor, draw closer. A shadowed figure walks around from behind. Arthur, still immobile, tracks the progress of a lanky man, sporting spiked yellow hair, a familiar orange vest and flat running shoes. Aside from the sickly, off green, skin tone, it looks like him.  _Another him._

The doppelganger moves up to examine Mystery and the arm dangling from his jaws, shaking its head in disappointment, “Should have known there was something weird about the dog. It’s always the pets.”

Arthur doesn’t care for whatever this creature is saying because, down below, just behind him, is Lewis body.  He’d just pushed Lewis off the cliff.

“To think, that could have been me, stuck in some rotting limb. Ugh. Gross.”

_He killed Lewis._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to Tumblr version [here](http://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/183212067742/msa-time-travel-idea-part-21)


	16. Counting down to Zero 3

_He killed Lewis._

Lewis, who he’d spent over a year searching for. Lewis, his best friend. Lewis who is now dead.

It can’t be real. It must be a nightmare. Any second now Arthur is going to wake up in his bed. All this is a bad dream, conjured by an overactive mind to torture him.  Arthur desperately clings to the notion. A bad dream. That’s all.  

“Boy did I have to do some serious reconstruction to get this up and running. It’s not often you see a memory buried this deep.”

Distantly, Arthur hears his doppelganger continue to chatter and pays the noise no mind. None of this is real, so it doesn’t matter what weird evil Arthur is saying.  Over and over, visions of Lewis falling repeat on loop.

“I bet you’ve been having loads of interesting nightmares…” The talking trails off, the doppelganger recognising its lack of audience.

“Hi? Hello? Are you listening?”

If Arthur could recoil, he would. But he’s still frozen. All he can do is focus on his mirror image while it leans in towards him, energetically waving a green hand, trying to catch his attention. Is this part of the nightmare too?

_This can’t be real._

A longsuffering sigh, “Why do I have to go through this every single time? You’re all so pathetically dumb I swear. “

“Yes. I’m definitely real. We’ve even met previously. Before you went and erased everything. Can’t you see the resemblance?” The copy pulls away, walking over to Mystery and gesturing meaningfully at the green arm.

Arthur’s mind runs a blank. A complete flat line of nothing. Slowly, the last few days of activity come trickling back. Arthur remembers starting the road trip. The disastrous motel stay. Leaving Vivi and Lewis. His Uncle is in hospital. He had met up with Darrel in the hospital car park.

Along with these memories comes a cold fear and deep-seated panic. _T_ _his isn’t a nightmare._ The doppelganger -no it’s not a just a doppelganger it’s worse! -grins unpleasantly in response to his growing horror.

 

_This is…real._

 

“Yup,” the Arthur-looking,  _demon monster,_  confirms cheerily, “All real. Or as real as a reconstructed memory can get anyway.”  

 

_But…that meant…that means that he had…_

“Killed Lewis?” The demon walks forward again, leaning in towards him, body language nonchalant, “Yeah. I’d say that’s pretty accurate.”

 _No_.

Immediately, the cheery smile disappears, replaced with disappointment and something akin to pity. Arthur’s stomach does a small flip, churning uncomfortably.  

A step back and the demon rises a hand, clicking its fingers with a dramatic flourish. Around Arthur, the air ripples like pond water. Suddenly, he can move. Mystery and the environment remain in a state of suspended animation, frozen, but he can move. He instantly stumbles forward, off-balance, knees hitting hard rock. Arthur gasps for air, forehead smacking against the ground. He curls up, shuddering. His left arm is back and whole again. Not that it matters. Under him, the dust and cold stone feel artificial against both his flesh hands.  

There is the sound of mismatched steps next to his ear.

“Come on then. I obviously have to spell this out.”

A hand grabs and yanks the back of his shirt, dragging him up into the air towards the cliff’s edge. Distantly, he notes that, while the demon is wearing his favoured orange vest, Arthur’s still in his clothes from the car park. He gulps, breath catching, determinedly closing his eyes. He’s not sure he can handle seeing Lewis.  _Not again._

“Ugh. Are you crying already?”  An exasperated voice sounds from behind. It would be a lot like his own voice if he were a sadistic asshole. Vaguely, Arthur notes that he is indeed crying, wet lines running down his face.

“Okay. Pay attention,” He is yanked higher and held out so he’s hanging by the back of this shirt with only the demon for support, "See that down there. That’s Lewis. He’s dead if you can’t tell. This around us is a memory. Your memory. Do I need to continue?”

Despite his best efforts, Arthur finds his eyes inadvertently opening when the demon gives him an impatient shake. From this high, it is hard to make out too many details aside from the fact that Lewis is impaled… unmoving…and definitely dead.  A lot of emotions-it’s hard to distinguish between them now- hit hard, ripping him up like a thousand tiny barbs. He just sniffs loudly, tears blurring out the sight.  

“…I killed…” He can’t say the full sentence out loud.

“Yes.  Poor Lewis, betrayed by his best friend, impaled in a cave. Left to rot. It’s a real tragedy,” The demon creature finishes, sounding a mix between amused and patiently board like Arthur is a particularly slow child.

 _But…It wasn’t him. He hadn’t been in control…_ Arthur attempts to rally, but he’s slipping back into panic and desperation.

“Please. You weren’t even trying to keep me out. I literally had control of one arm, maybe part of a leg, and still managed to push Lewis. You had, like, 80% of the body and failed. Face it. Lewis just wasn’t that important to you. And you know what? I think he knew it. Why else would he linger around for retribution?”

The words hit hard, tanking any semblance of courage with renewed self-hatred.  _Lewis is dead, and it’s his fault._

The demon pulls him up back onto the ledge, spinning him around and studying Arthur with an expression of intense consideration.  Arthur’s just glad he doesn’t have to see Lewis’s body anymore.

“Of course, none of that explains the time travel,” The demon uses its free hand to scratch the stubble at his chin in a familiar movement, “It’s not the fox. Couldn’t be. Not the right domain for one. Wouldn’t have enough influence for another. Not after being stuck in that ugly dog disguise.”

“Time travel…” Arthur repeats, sluggishly flowing the address. Right. This is a memory. A memory from the timeline he had changed. The awareness flickers like a dim light.  _Lewis is still alive._  His mind is muddled, and he’s not quite sure where which memories end and begin anymore, but he knows this one fact.  _Lewis is alive. Currently, Lewis and Vivi are safe, miles away._   _This is all in his past._

“You really think so do you?” The pointed comment derails the spark of hope with a sharp stab of fear, “You think they’re safe now? That your failure won’t have consequences? How many humans can say they’ve had a second chance? None. That’s how many. There are these Rules you see. Dumb but mostly unbreakable. Once in a millennia chance and you still screw it up.”

Arthur finds himself once again at the edge of the cliff, tips of his shoes scraping for a foothold.

“But don’t take it from me…” The demon continues, holding the front of his shirt now, inching him back, “Let’s see what Lewis thinks.”

It gives him a cold smile. Arthur falls back, watching his copy wave as he plummets down.  

. . .

_Arthur’s not sure where he is, but it’s dark. His head is pounding, his mechanical arm limp, and he feels like one big bruise. Not too shocking, considering his last memory is crashing the van after being run off the road by a psycho ghost truck._

 

_In the dark, shadows move, and Arthur flinches away when a bright purple flame blinks into existence.  Speaking of psycho ghosts. Slowly, one by one, purple torches come to life, burning with unnatural light. A suspiciously familiar cave is revealed. Fear catches his breath._ _He knows this place._

 

_RUN. The need escape is instinctual. Something evil is lurking in the walls. Watching him._

_Small pink ghosts dart out, glaring, closing in on him. Arthur scrambles back and sprints away. At a fork, splitting the otherwise straight tunnel in two, Arthur automatically turns to the farthest track. His way is_ _blocked by more of the purple ghosts, all of whom hiss and growl, forcing him to backpeddle and pick the other rout._

_Arthur is so focused on running that he almost runs right over the edge of a high cliff when the tunnel abruptly opens onto a narrow platform. Down below are rows of familiar stone spikes. His one working arm spins widely as he tries to maintain his balance. He almost tips forward when a wave of vertigo sweeps through him.  A horrible sense of deja- vu tugs at his memories. Why is this place so painfully familiar?_

_Relief, at managing to maintain his position and not go toppling to his doom, is short lived. The crackle of hostile fire is his only warning before a large hand grips the front of his shirt. Arthur is roughly hoisted into the air. He flails about but only manages to make himself dizzy._

_It’s the psycho ghost, and it’s mad._

 

_There’s no doubt to what it intends to do. Arthur freezes up lest he hastens his demise with a misplaced kick. Vague memories of green and something pulling apart his mind tugs at his thoughts, distracting him.  Unsympathetically, Arthur is held out over the cliff.  The sparking pain in his messed-up arm gives him enough awareness to move it up to hopelessly cling to the ghost’s arm._

 

_A burst of angry purple. And Lewis there. It’s Lewis but his face is hateful._

 

_“Lewis?”_

 

_Arthur’s grip falters as the ghost’s hold loosens. The world is fuzzy, and he’s falling. Half-formed recollections pool about, dragging his attention away from the death currently rushing to greet him. It’s Lewis! Lewis is the mansion ghost! All that time spent searching, and Lewis is dead._

_Lewis’s glare follows his decent. Air rushes past, pulling at his hair and clothes.  His long lost friend rapidly shrinks, gravity pulling him away. Something rips through his back and up into his chest._

_He slams onto the twisted spikes, chest breaking open. Pain. Unbearable pain. Wet collects in his throat, choking him. Everything blurs._

 

**“Stop. Stop.”**

Reality warps. The wet pain fades, dulling. He’s no longer choking because he’s no longer breathing. Everything is frozen. High above, Arthur can just make out Lewis’s blurry skeletal form, silhouetted against high stone walls.

Finally, he has his answers. It doesn’t matter that all this has technically never happened, because he had still killed Lewis and then Lewis had killed him. After hours upon hours of agonising ignorance, he has the truth.

He knows  _why_. Retribution. Revenge. Something in between.

 It’s terrible. What’s worse is Arthur has no idea how he’ll stop it all from happening again. The demon is right. He  _has_  failed. He’s failed harder than any normal person should be able to. And he’s done it twice.  _He should have stayed dead._

A grinning face fills his vision. Bright green eyes crinkle in amusement.

“Ouchies. That looks painful,” It laughs, “Bright side? At least you know how Lewis felt in his final moments.”

The demon turns its piercing gaze from Arthur, studying the stalagmites around them. The scene shudders, rippling out like disturbed water. The demon flickers, fading out of existence. Suddenly…

_…His vision is failing, blurring together. There is something lodged in his chest. He can’t breathe. Lewis. That had been Lewis. Why. Had Arthur done something wrong?…If he could just… go back….Everything’s dark…_

 

**“And…stop”**

The pain drops away, and he’s numb again. This time Arthur just gazes blankly up, too mentally exhausted to think on the implications of anything anymore. The demon is walking around out of sight, footsteps light. Dully, Arthur notes that he has a large stone point protruding through the bottom half of his chest, glistening with his own blood.

“Looks like there’s nothing here either. What a bust. You’d think that something like time travel would leave a mark, but nooooo, that would be too easy. Unless… ”

The demon comes back into view, leaning over his chest. Arthur follows its gaze and is horrified to see the dim shine of something abnormal pulsing just below his collar bone. It appears to be a ball of fire in the process of both exploding out and collapsing inwards.

“Your soul,” The demon explains, noting Arthur’s attention, “Seconds away from passing. Or, in your case, time travelling.”

A thoughtful hum and a frustrated breath follow the explanation, and the other creature moves in for a better view.

"Perhaps a last wish or death curse…” It mutters, “A Dying Will can be pretty powerful… just not powerful enough for time travel. You humans would be jumping all over the place if that were true. A catalyst maybe?”

A pause.

Arthur goes back to watching Lewis’s frozen ghost form far up above. It might be his imagination, but Lewis almost seems sad, leaning over the cliff, looking like he’d tried to catch Arthur as he fell. _It’s probably his imagination._

“…Well, it does explain the increase in spiritual power. The older and younger souls must have merged. Not great for you, but a nice bonus for me,” The demon is still muttering to itself, raising its voice to catch Arthur’s attention again.

“All right. As much as I would love to pick all this apart, we have real-world appointments to keep sooooo…”

The sound of fingers clicking.  The memory around them fades. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to tumblr version [here](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/183354433107/msa-time-travel-idea-part-22)


	17. Counting down to Zero (Vivi)

“Something’s not right,” Vivi mumbles, examining the mess she’s made. Strewn across the ugly motel carpet is a mix of clothing items and assorted techy stuff. Important techy stuff. The stuff Arthur lunged around wherever he went. She’d never seen a person more attached to their computer, and yet he’d left it behind.

Don’t even get her started on the more concerning discoveries. Anxiety medication? A Psych referral? To her knowledge, Arthur hadn’t needed either since high school. Obviously, she can’t count on her compressive Arthur-related understanding anymore. Not with her recent track record. Arthur’s not really a talky-feely person, but that’s never mattered because he’s always been bad at hiding things from her. Until now.  Something’s changed,  _and she hadn’t noticed._ Or hadn’t noticed its severity at any rate. 

Frustrated, she dumps what remains of Arthur’s bag out. There is nothing else of note. It’s not like she’s expecting a convenient list of ‘reason why Arthur’s acting weird’ but something tangible would have been nice. Damn it.

Behind her, Lewis steps in closer, and she shoots a glance over her shoulder. His eyes are shaded by his hair puff, so she can’t make out his expression, but he’s slumped. Lost in his own head. Probably, overthinking things and blaming himself. Lewis takes everything personally, so this whole situation is undoubtedly hitting him hard.

Unfortunately, Vivi’s at a loss on how to comfort him. She’s never seen Lewis and Arthur fight or yell. They’re both pretty passive guys, preferring to talk through any disagreement. Not that they’ve had many of those or anything even remotely like …whatever  _that_ had been. She’d never seen either argue like  _that_ , all pain and raw emotion. Arthur panicking and defensive. Lewis pushing when he should be waiting, visibly hurting.  

She had had a choice, stay and talk to Lewis or go outside with Arthur. She’d chosen Lewis because Arthur wanted to be alone and he had obviously needed space to collect himself. Had it been the wrong move? Should she have insisted on following Arthur? She doesn’t know. Vivi doesn’t know how to convince Lewis that none of this is his fault or what to do without the van. She doesn’t know where Arthur went or why.

_When had not knowing something ever stopped her from ploughing ahead!_ Nothing ever got done through sitting around thinking about ‘what ifs.’ She wants answers? Well, to get answers, she needs Arthur. To find Arthur they need transport and some method of locating him. With a new goal, she pulls out her phone, trying to check their location. None of her maps work, and she scowls, cursing the poor internet connection.

Vivi stands abruptly, startling Lewis. Technology isn’t the only source of information. She marches straight out the still open door, ignoring the taller man for the moment, intent on pulling aside the first stranger she sees. It just so happens that a man in a faded, ‘route 66’ shirt is packing up a car two steps from her room.

“Hey you,” She yells, powerwalking up, “Where are you heading?“

“Ah,” The man stalls, staring at her like she’s grown an additional head. Vivi realises she’s still in her pyjamas. Powder blue, long-sleeved, dotted in fluffy clouds, it’s not normal person clothing.  Coupled with her messy bed hair, she’s probably giving off some strong crazy-person vibes.

“Sorry. Madam. I’m afraid I can’t help right now….” The dude slams the back door and practically leaps into the front seat in his effort to escape her.

“It was just a question!” She calls after him, irritated.

Okay. So maybe accosting the first person she saw wasn’t the best idea. Vivi frowns, trying to approach the problem more logically. There are no other people the immediate vicinity, and her focus jumps between the road and gas station sporadically. She takes a deep breath, re-centring herself. All this pent-up energy needs to go somewhere productive, or she’ll just spin in circles. Maybe, she should start by changing her clothes and wrangling Lewis. He’s missed her faux pas, but she’s sure he would have found it funny on a good day. A frustrated breath.

Lewis is standing exactly where she left him, lost in thought, Arthur’s referral loose in his hand.

“Lewis! Get dressed,” She orders loudly, re-entering, beelining to her bag. Lewis blinks, losing his deep contemplative frown, focusing back on her.

“We’re finding a way out of this town, van or no van, even if we have to walk. Are you with me?”  She needs him to focus on their current mission and not on Arthur,  _or the possibility that Arthur really does fear him for legitimate reasons. Nothing scares her more than that._

“Right.” Lewis answers slowly, seeming to shake off part of his funk, “You’re right…You have a plan?” He sounds so pathetically hopeful. Energetically, she spins and points a finger right at his nose. No more angsting until they know what’s really going on.

“Get dressed. Get packed. Get gone.”  

A small smile flickers briefly across his face, “Detailed. I like it.”

“Well, we also need to find a person who knows a way out of this place, and maybe some way of actually locating Arthur. Wasn’t as catchy to say though,” She elaborates.

The smile fades into something more neutral and contemplative, “How about we start with the reception desk.”  

That was…logical.

“Right. Let’s do that,” Vivi agrees, then mutters, “Why didn’t I think of that?” It would have saved that poor guy a bit of a fight.

Now there is a bit of forwarding momentum, Lewis seems lighter. While she changes into a blue shirt and matching skirt, Lewis tries calling Arthur again, is unsuccessful, then pulls on his own set of clothes. Neither of them looks particularly well put together, but it’s better than nothing. Lewis even forgoes his usual routine, giving him a rugged, frazzled appearance.

Never before have the two of them ever left anywhere in under half an hour. Lewis has an overly long prep ritual and she leaves everything to the last second, so they always take longer than is probably reasonable.

Today they’re ready in ten minutes.

“Mystery,” She calls over her dog who’s been patiently watching Lewis and her rush around, “Who’s a good boy,” she whispers, scratching under his ear. Petting Mystery never fails to calm her nerves.

“I think that’s everything,” Lewis comments holding an arm out towards the door. Their bags are now stacked neatly in the corner, and the poorly decorated room is back to being sparse and empty.  

“To the reception?”

“Mission: Find Arthur is a go,” She agrees, grabbing Lewis’s hand, tucking it under her arm. Lewis, being a lot taller, must lean in a bit, especially when she’s walking slightly ahead, but he doesn’t seem to mind. Mystery trots along behind them without prompting. They cross the car pack and enter the small reception area.

Vivi doesn’t bother waiting for the lady to acknowledge their presence, pulling Lewis right up to the counter, and slamming down a hand, It makes a loud snapping sound. The woman jumps.  

“You know how we can get out of this town without a car?” Vivi goes right for the question she wants to be answered. There is no way she was wasting time with pleasantries. Not right now.

The woman glances between them, raising a brow, “Room 11? That was fast.”

“We’ve been staying in room 11. Is there a problem?” Lewis answers with a bit more restraint, leaving a deliberate question hanging in the air.

“Saw your buddy drive off. Thought it was odd. He left you a note,” A gesture towards a folded piece of paper, sitting isolated near the edge of the desk. Vivi stanches it up, ignoring the continuing exchange. She spins, freeing her arm from Lewis so she can unfold it.

“Arthur was here?” Lewis asks, eyes tracking Vivi’s quick movements before refocusing briefly on the reception-woman, “What did he look like? Was he okay?”

“Bit twitchy. Wasn’t really paying attention.”

The note is a collection of short sentences in Arthur’s messy cursive. Short on content. Short on detail. Short on anything useful.

_“Had to leave._

_Uncle Lance is in hospital._

_I promise I’ll explain later._

_Sorry.”_

Her mind buzzes with its implications, throwing fuel on the worry-fire slowly growing in her stomach. Lance was in the hospital? How? Why would Arthur leave without mentioning it? She’s known Lance since she was five! Sure, the old man was standoffish, but she still cares about the guy. Did Arthur think she didn’t? Vivi tries to picture Arthur, getting bad news about his Uncle, and panicking.  _AND_ , instead of coming to them, his friends, for help, he had driven off alone. Surely, the distance between them wasn’t so great that Arthur felt he couldn’t come to them for support even when things were a bit rocky.  It lent a little credence to her ‘something bad is stopping Arthur from telling them the truth’ theory.  

She turns to say something to Lewis but hesitates. It’s not often that Vivi finds herself at a loss for words, but damn it if this whole situation isn’t dumping her right out of her comfort zone. Lewis, who is now leaning over her shoulder tracing the note with his eyes, looks like he’s swallowed a lemon.

Vivi hands the note over- Lewis takes the piece of paper gingerly-refocusing on the receptionist. At least now they know where Arthur is going. There is only one hospital anywhere near Kingsman Mechanics.

“Is there a way to get out of this town for people without a vehicle,” She repeats her earlier question more calmly. She’ll find Arthur and give him emotional support whether he wants it or not, dammit.

“Only the Interstate Bus Line. It stops here around 6am every day. This isn’t a great place to get stranded in let me tell you.” That women’s attention is now shifting away and back to a magazine, losing interest.  Vivi glances back to Lewis, but he’s still staring at the note. Aggressively, a bit more than strictly necessary, she pulls him away from the desk into a cramped corner.

“Lewis,” Vivi pokes him in the side to get his attention, murmuring softly, “We’ll worry about it later.”

Before he can object or respond, she continues, whispering, “How much money do we have saved for this trip again?”

Lewis frowns, tucking the note away in his top breast pocket, perplexed, “$2000?”

Good. Not a huge amount but, including Vivi’s personal saving, she has $2300. Hopefully, I’ll get someone interested. The town didn’t seem particularly affluent, so she likes the odds. She nods once, twisting back to the desk.

“Hey. Lady.”

She waits for the women’s begrudging attention.

“I’ll give $2300 to the next person to get us to Tempo, Milton or somewhere nearby. It’s eight hours from here.”

“Not really any taxi’s around,” Is the increasingly bored response.

“Did I say taxi?” Vivi interrupts, “I’m asking if you know anyone who’ll drive us to Tempo for $2300.”

A flash of renewed attention ignites before fading, the woman-maybe they should have asked her name- sighs.  “Just my luck that I’m stuck in this shit hole for the next week. I’d take you up on that offer. Hold on,” Irritated, unnamed-lady pulls out a mobile, “I know someone who needs the cash.”

While the lady dials out and talks briefly to a man on the other end, Vivi looks back at Lewis not quite sure how he’ll take her blowing their entire savings on this endeavour. She needn’t have worried because he’s giving her that proud, gooey-warm smile that never fails to make her blush. Blood rushes to her face, and she turns away. Stay on task. Lewis is in a slightly better mood, check that off, now she needs to reach Arthur.

“So, my cousins’ got a small pick-up you can probably buy for around $2500,” The woman turns, having finished a half-muttered conversation, “It’ll get you where you want, he guarantees it. You interested?”

The price is a little high, but before she can start trying to haggle Lewis steps forward.

“That sounds fine, ah, Ms???”

Right. Lewis had savings as well. She shoots him a grateful smile.    

“The name’s Claire. You can finalise stuff with Jamie when he gets here,” Claire waves them away, glancing over at Lewis now.

“How long until your cousin gets here, Claire?” He asks deliberately.

“Since you’re obviously in a rush? I can probably have him here in half an hour.”

So, all going well, they’d be about two-three hours behind Arthur. Vivi could go out and make her offer to more people, but she doesn’t like the uncertainty when this one seems decent enough. This is probably their surest course.

“Sounds good,” She agrees, nodding.

Claire sighs, making a dismissive motion, “Suppose I should wish you luck in finding your twitchy friend. You want to check out now or after you see the pick-up?”

They check out, Claire tells them to leave whenever because there isn’t anyone booked in till tomorrow. They relocate outside to sit together on the small step next to their motel door, waiting.  _Waiting_. Time ticks by, made unbearably slow by the consent checking of her watch. Gradually, the word around them brightens, the morning progressing. Vivi leans into Lewis, bouncing her leg to rig herself of excess energy. She would be up and pacing back and forth, but Lewis has an arm around her shoulders, pulling her close. Mystery positions himself on her opposite side, shoving his face into her lap for pats.  If the circumstances were different, she’d probably enjoy sitting like this.

Another attempt at calling Arthur goes through to voice mail. Internally, she reaffirms her mission. Find Arthur. Find out what’s going on. Help in any way she could. That’s what friends did.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to tumblr version [here](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/183744074592/msa-time-travel-idea-part-23)


	18. Counting down to Zero 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to [purplepencilshades](https://purplepencilshades.tumblr.com/) for the cool art of this chapter. Can be found [HERE.](https://purplepencilshades.tumblr.com/post/185807657392/a-gift-for-pi-cat000-i-adore-their-fics-and-i) (warning: it has depictions of blood and stuff)

The transition from ‘skewered on a stone spike’ to the real, physical world, is jarring.  It’s like being thrown against a solid, brick wall of sensation.  Touch, smell, and sight all crash into Arthur simultaneously, several times more intense than reliving the reconstructed memories.

Artificial fluorescent light, the lingering smell of petrol, and distant sounds of a car engine, all compete for his attention. Internally, Arthur wrestles with his new world view. He is still trying to process that, not only does he deserve every misfortune suffered since Lewis’s disappearance in his original timeline, including his own death at Lewis’s hands, but he has also managed to wreck his second chance.  _Failure. Complete, catastrophic failure. That’s what this whole trip into the past has been._

While he struggles to mentally recalibrate, his physical body is already strolling forward across the underground parking lot unhindered. The thing controlling his body knows exactly what it’s doing, walking up to where Darrel is unconscious and sprawled on the ground. The hospital car park- because this is definitely the park under St Peter’s Emergency Centre- remains devoid of people and appears unchanged despite Arthur feeling like he’s just lived through several days’ worth of unpleasant memories.  _How does that work?_ Arthur tries to reconcile the idiosyncrasy amongst his disorientation.  _Not even a second’s past!_

“Actually, it’s been about two minutes,” Comes the cheerful verbal reply. Arthur goes very still at the address, his chaotic thoughts finally quietening to focus in on the second entity sitting alongside him. He doesn’t try and respond. He’s not sure if he should. Honestly, he’s half terrified that responding is going to draw unwanted attention when he desperately needs time to pull his thoughts together without being derailed.  _Bad enough that he’s struggling to think coherently, he doesn’t need someone else making it worse._

His?…Its?... body, snorts in amusement but reframes from commenting further, crouching down next to Darrel, scanning the unconscious man for an elongated second. It is odd. Arthur can feel himself move. He just can’t control any of it.

More disturbing, is how oddly happy and satisfied he feels. Sure, stress and fear are around, but they are muted and faded to a background hum. Logically, it makes sense. Emotions were a physical reaction, triggered in the brain. If the demon controlled his body, then it also controlled his body’s emotional responses. Just because Arthur remembers some high school biology fact does not make the experience any less jarring. It’s wrong to feel euphorically happy while his world crumbles around him.  _No wonder he’s having trouble thinking straight._

“I should probably find somewhere a little more private for this shouldn’t I?” The demon remarks after its short inspection, glancing around, attention fixing onto his van.

Arthur is pretty strong, physically, for his size, a side effect of an active lifestyle and demanding mechanical work. However, Darrel is tall and on the weightier side of things, meaning the demon is forced to drag the unconscious man by a leg across the concrete.

“Jeez, go on a diet or something,” The demon criticises, knocking and jostling Darrel about like he’s a sack of potatoes. It obviously shares Arthur’s physical limitations because it struggles for a good five minutes before finally forcing Darrel into the van. Arthur maintains an anxious, worried quiet, silently watching the doors to his van slam shut with needless force.

The demon mimes wiping dust off its hands in an exaggerated action, “Speaking of diets. Man am I hungry. You could definitely stand to feed this thing more, we’re running on empty here.”

Arthur feels his body stretch its arms up, loosening his shoulder muscles in a move he, himself, did habitually after lifting something heavy. Next, they’re moving around to the driver’s seat, pulling out keys, and Arthur finally puts two and two together.  _They’re leaving the hospital and going somewhere else._ In amongst all the suffering and confusion, he’d forgotten the reason he was at the hospital to begin with. Uncle Lance.  _Was his Uncle even in the hospital? Or was it all a trick?_

“Oh. That was all true. Our dear Uncle really is in dire straits,” The demon answers his unasked question, flipping the van’s ignition. The engine vibrates under them.

 _‘What did you do?’_  Arthur is almost dreading the answer, but he needs to know. The need momentarily outweighs his fear, pulling his focus away from thoughts of Lewis and his rediscovered memories.

“So now you want to talk? Thought I was getting the silent treatment for a second there.”

Frustration and apprehension bubbles across his mind. ‘ _What did you do? Tell me!’_

“Calm down,” The van jerks forward, spinning towards the exit, “We’ll get to Uncle Lance soon enough. That’s a promise.”

Arthur mentally recoils at a sensation of saccharine delight.  _It’s not him feeling that. It can’t be._

“…and I always keep my promises.”

A renewed weight bears down upon him, studying his reactions, watching him squirm. He tries to retreat, but there is nowhere to go. It makes for a disorientating car ride on Arthur’s part, knocking his cognitive processes askew, so he barely notices the passage of time. Lost in memory, his mind and body out of sync, he misses the trip through town, only getting shocked back into the present when the van turns suddenly onto an unsealed road.  Rough and marred with potholes, the small track isn’t made for larger vehicles, causing everything to shake unsteadily.

The clock on the dashboard reads 3:52pm, meaning he’s lost about forty minutes. The demon is humming along to the radio, utterly relaxed despite the bumpy ride.  Apprehension grows as Arthur focuses on the scenery visible ahead. The area is mostly flat, littered with stone bluffs and tall cactus. Empty of civilisation.   _There are no good reasons for them to be out here._

The van lurches to a stop, smack in the middle of the uninhabited terrain.“This should be far enough.”

The demon pivots around, leaning over the seat divider, scanning the Darrel-shaped lump in the back, “How’s the passenger going? Good? No complaints? That’s always a nice change.”

Next, they are clambering over the seat, pushing aside camping gear, and reaching over Darrel to throw open the back doors. Darrel groans, having been accidentally kneed in the stomach.

 _‘What are you doing!’_  Arthur panics. He has a horrible suspicion, and he hopes he’s wrong.

“We,” The demon emphasis the word, shoving Darrel towards the open doors with a foot, “are tying up a loose end.”

_‘What does that mean?’_

“Oh, I think you know what it means.”

Another groan from Darrel who is stirring awake.

“Waking up I see. Just in time too,” An unceremonious kick, the demon braces its back against the front seats for leverage, and the barely conscious Darrel goes tumbling out onto rock and dirt with a heavy thud. 

Arthur would have had to have been an idiot to have not to have realised the demon’s plans by now. Even is his state of disorientation.

 _‘You don’t have to do this! He wouldn’t tell anyone about any of this. Who would believe him even if he did say anything? No one believes in this stuff,’_  He tries to argue, thoughts coming out jumbled and half-formed, memories of The Cave resurfacing. Specifically, memories of returning from The Cave, of knowing that something usual had happened, and no one believing him.

“Ha. Tell me about it. No one believes me about this stuff either,” The sharp tone pulls attention back. The demon climbs after Darrel. Its movements have taken on a predatory likeness, hyper-focused, buzzing with coiled energy. Arthur can feel its excited anticipation at odds with his own panic.

_‘Stop!’_

Arthur tries to do something,  _anything_ , but there are no footholds. He’s nothing but disembodied thought. He might as well be smoke, trying to stop a landslide.

The demon stalks forward, nudging Darrel onto his back, resting a foot on the other man’s chest and leaning in. The sun overhead is relentlessly bright, causing a shadow to fall across Darrel’s face. The multi-tool on Arthur’s keyring is brought out, small knife flipping open and held up.

“Wakey-wakey,” The demon taps a finger against Darrel’s forehead, causing the other man’s eyes to flutter open. There is a moment of confusion.

“You know his biggest fear was dying an insignificant death,” Arthur hears himself comment conversationally while they seemingly wait for Darrel to focus.

_‘Stop. Whatever you’re doing. Just stop.’_

“It’s funny because the only reason he’s here is because I needed a way to get to you. I’m sure he would have lived a long, fulling life otherwise.”

Darrel’s eyes have widened, clearing with renewed awareness. They shift to meet Arthur’s gaze, then move to land on the knife he’s holding.

“An extra in your own life. Isn’t that sad?” A patronising tutting sound and an exaggerated disappointed head shake, “Doesn’t get much more insignificant than this....”

Arthur’s body raises an arm, flicking the knife effortlessly across the other man’s throat. The jab is so quick and precise that Arthur doesn’t have a chance to object future. Blood splatters across the weeds and dirt. Whatever Darrel may have said comes across grabbled, choking off and dying.

“Insignificant and worthless to the end,” A chuckle. The demon flips the knife shut with a flourish. Tiny blood splotches speckle Arthur’s face and clothing.

Arthur’s brain freezes, thoughts grinding to an abrupt halt.

“Oh, come on. That was funny,” The creature laughs, amusement echoing, rippling out towards Arthur. A sick joy at Darrel’s misfortune. Guilt and horror build as well, faint but there, buried under the delight and satisfaction. At least Arthur can say that  _that_  is all him because t _here is no way this creature feels guilt!_

A disappointed huff, “All those wonderful emotions and you pick that? Humans. No appreciation for cosmic irony.”

 _It’s not like he can control anything anymore. This isn’t him. IT’S NOT HIM!!!_  He doesn’t know why he’s trying to defend himself. He’s just killed a person, and he’s happy about it.  _That’s not him feeling that. It’s not!_

“Sure, it is. It’s just a matter of perspective.”

Arthur’s too busy mentally freaking out to give callous statement much attention.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to tumblr version [here.](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/184025208982/msa-time-travel-idea-part-24)


	19. Counting down to Zero 5

_“Welcome to MacDonalds Sir. Can I take your order?”_

The van stops at a drive-through, halfway to the hospital and his Uncle. Doom hangs over Arthur like a dense grey fog. A clock slowly counting down.

“Hey. You want anything?” The demon asks, nonchalantly rifling around in the glovebox for spare change.

Arthur’s never swum in the ocean, but he’s watched enough media to estimate and guess that this is what drowning feels like. Memories crash over him, pulling him about in waves. It’s had to keep a grip on what is current and what is past. It’s hitting him all at once. Images of Lewis falling are now mixing in with frames on Darrel’s motionless body left out in the middle of nowhere, carelessly kicked to the side of a narrow dirt road. Alone. Just like Lewis. _Left behind to rot._  Who knows if anyone would find him. Did Darrel have a family? Arthur can’t remember. What he does know is that it’s  _all his fault…and he can’t stop. Arthur needs help. He desperately needs help, but there’s no one. The only people who care are miles away and completely ignorant._

_‘Why?’_

The question is out before he gets the chance to clarify, his thoughts not coherent enough to manage a full sentence.  _There must be a reason._ A point to everything. Because, if there isn’t, then there is no way that Arthur can convince this creature to stop. To leave his Uncle alone.

“Cause we’re hungry. Duh. Try not to ask dumb questions.” Arthur is dismissed, the demon turning back to order. So far, it has been quiet, exuding a calm satisfaction which is only marginally better than manic joy, ignoring Arthur’s thrashing with practised ease. This is the first time Arthur’s had the presence of mind to communicate since leaving Darrel.

At the order collection window, as the serving-girl hands over a brown and red paper bag, she points to her cheek, commenting, “Um. Sir. You have a little dirt on your face. Just there.”

“Do I?” The demon laughs good-naturedly, adjusting the rear-view mirror to reveal their reflection. Arthur looks out, unable to help himself, meeting his own gaze. Bright green eyes stare right at him. The pleasant smile shifts to become mocking. The ‘dirt’ referred to is the small flecks of Darrel’s blood, which have dried a dark brown.

“I do indeed. How embarrassing,” It chuckles, taking the bag, “Thank you for pointing that out.”

The girl smiles back, “Hey no problem. Have a good afternoon sir.”

If only she would lean further out and see the prominent blood splatter across Arthur’s front. She doesn’t. He watches powerlessly, feeling his body wave a goodbye.  

“Have to say. I love these new food options. You humans have certainly been busy this last century.”

Now. This is Arthur's opportunity to talk. He needs to use it and convince this creature to stop. It probably won’t work, if anything it’ll make everything worse,  _but he must try_.

 _‘Why,’_  Arthur asks a second time, pulling his focus forward.

“Why what,” The demon is deliberately obtuse, taking a bite with its free hand, steering back onto the highway with the other. Arthur would be grimacing at the taste. The last thing he wants to do is to eat greasy food. Luckily, nausea is primary a physical phenomenon, so his need to throw up is entirely associative.

 _‘Why are you doing this. What’s the point?’_  How does he get it to stop?

The demon chews and slurps down a soda methodically like it is buying time to consider a response. More likely, it knows how anxious waiting makes Arthur.

“Because it’s fun. You know...Spread a little pain and misery. Cause trouble. Mess with the cosmic balance. You do know what fun is right?"

 _‘I can be plenty miserable without Uncle Lance dying.’_ Arthur jumps on the connection despite how tenuous it is, _‘You’ve seen my memories! I can make anything good depressing if I want to.’_

“Ha. Yeah. You do know how to screw yourself over. But, regrettably, I never leave a host alive. Personal policy. Less hassle down the line and all.”

 _‘He’ll be no hassle.’_  Arthur lies blatantly because there was no way Lance wouldn’t try to hunt them down if given a chance, _‘Nope. No hassle at all. No one would care if I vanished right now. Especially not Lance.’_

“I’m in your head, I can see you lying,” An eye roll, followed by unpleasant chuckling, “Besides, nothing beats the rush of cutting one of your pathetic lives short. All that potential. Poof. Gone.” The discordant sensation of happiness is back again, and Arthur quickly withdraws, mentally flinching away, doing his best to distance himself.

_‘Someone will stop you.’_

“Who will? The dog? It’s miles away. Won’t be here till tomorrow and by then we’ll be done and dusted. I was thinking of going after Lewis’s family next. Sneak on in, in the dead of night, get em all in their sleep…”

Any further attempts at reasoning fall on deft ears. Begging is just as ineffective. All it does is inflate the awful feeling of calm satisfaction. Apprehensively, Arthur watches the demon wipe the blood off their shared face, energy well and truly spent. A grin is flashed towards the rear-view mirror which has yet to be re-adjusted. Not like this thing cares about road safety. It makes Arthur want to laugh hysterically. But he can’t.  _He can’t do anything._

Half an hour later, after getting waylaid by some traffic, they’re back at the hospital. All up, it’s hardly been two hours since their departure. They even park in the same spot.

Before heading inside, the demon pulls on one of Arthur’s old work shirts, which he keeps in the van for spur of the moment mechanical work. It’s got a few oil stains down the side and hasn’t seen a good wash in a while, but is inconspicuous when compared to coffee and blood splatters. Now, apart from the eyes, there is no other noticeable difference between the two of them. Nothing that screams ‘I’m a demon on a murder spree, please stop me.’ The sickly green skin Arthur had noted in his memories has faded to a natural colour. 

St Peter’s Emergency Ward is as cold and sterile as he remembers. The smell of disinfectant and the return to chilled air-conditioning are equally unwelcome. Nurses, doctors and members of the public mill around, murmuring and talking in low tones.  _‘Someone notice! Please,’_ Arthur thinks desperately while the demon obtains directions from the reception desk. Despite Arthur’s less than clean appearance no one spares a second glance. Everyone is too busy, caught up in their work and lives, to notice his one falling apart.  

An older, matronly woman, sporting a messy bun and tired eyes, ends up leading Arthur to his Uncle’s recovery room. It’s not too far from the main entrance and is, to his dismay, empty of other patents. Space, meant for a second bed, is vacant.

Arthur, the demon- he’s having trouble separating the two -both watch the nurse check his Uncle’s IV, lowering the dosage of whatever is going into Lance’s arm. Probably a mix of pain medication and anti-inflammatories going off Arthur’s previous experience. Curiosity and interest flash between their shared mind.  _It_  is taking notes, intently watching the nurse work.  _Please. Turn around. Turn around and notice what a creepy monster he’s being._

When she does turn, Arthur has already stepped away, acting the part of the worried relative.

“Is he okay. Everything’s okay, right?”

“Your Uncle is recovering as per normal. He’s on a low dose of Dilaudid, to reduce pain and swelling.  It’ll make him drowsy when he regains consciousness so don’t be alarmed if he has trouble forming sentences,”

“He’ll regain consciousness? That’s good. When will that happen?” Its barely contained eagerness makes Arthur want to cry in dismay.  

“Another hour or two,” The woman gives him a perplexed sideward glance. If she does notice anything strange, it isn’t mentioned. “I’ll have a doctor come by and give you a proper run down and better details shortly.”

“Good. Good. That’s very good. Thank you for letting me know,”

A nod. A kind expression. She moves to away, passing by, leaving Arthur alone. She leaves the demon alone with his Uncle unconscious, helpless in the bed. Eagerly, the demon piolets his body forward, scanning the empty room, eyes landing briefly on the solitary clock decorating the otherwise sparse walls. 4: 59. Tick. Tick. Tick. An audible reminder that Arthur is running out of time. A hand reaches into his pocket to fiddle with Arthur’s keys and the small knife attached. Both are crusted with dry blood which crumbles when touched. They clink together threateningly.

‘ _What do I have to do to get you to stop. You have to want something. Anything._ ’

“Sure, I do. It’s just nothing you can give .” Nonchalantly, it approaches the bed, finally acknowledging Arthur's presence.

 _‘Don’t demons collect souls?’_  He asks with increasing desperation.  _Can he give this thing his soul?_  Was that something he could do?

“Some. I don’t. I think you’ll find that ‘demon’ is a very broad term, covering a wide range of individuals. Besides, your soul is super screwy. Whatever’s shoved it back in here has bound it in tight, so I’d probably have to rip it up to get it free, rendering the activity pointless. So, no deal…But thanks for the offer. I’m flattered.”

_‘Please. Stop. I’ll do anything!’_

Does he really have nothing? No way to save his Uncle. The only member of his whole freakin family who gave a damn and he can’t even save him. Useless. Why does he fail in all the ways that matter most?

“Oh, don’t mope. Just think, once we finish up here, you’ll never have to worry about failing anybody ever again. No lying. No stress. Doesn’t that sound nice.”

It doesn’t sound nice.  _It’s the opposite of nice!_

The demon drags over the one visitor's chair, which squeaks along the lino flooring, slumping down to stare at his uncle, waiting. It fingers the IV tubing, tracing the piping up to the control dial and back again. Deliberately, it pinches the thin tube shut, attention jumping back to Lance, scanning for any changes.

Waiting.

The waiting is terrible. Especially, when Arthur can feel its attention, partially giddy, laser-focused onto his Uncle. Arthur’s never seen the man look so pale or sickly. Apart from the odd work-related accident, which is impossible to avoid even with strict safety standards, his Uncle has always been healthy. Even the rare times he has seen the man sick it was still ‘no big deal,’ ‘just a scratch,’ or ‘the bodies way of forcing me ta rest.’ While Arthur flip-flopped from one emotional extreme to the next, his Uncle had been a steady, seemingly indestructible, pillar of support. Arthur had never said thank you for any of that. Worse, he’d repaid all that kindness with lies and evasion. Lance should have never taken him in. He had been more trouble than it was worth in his original timeline and he’s definitely not worth it now.

“Hey. HEY!” The demon grows tired of the waiting and gives his Uncle a light slap on the cheek with its free hand, “Wake up.”

“Arthur?” The word is half muttered, barely audible. Lance is phasing into consciousness slowly.  

‘ _Just say asleep. Stay asleep a little longer. Someone has to come in and stop him. Please.’_

“In a manner of speaking. Yeah. I’m Arthur.”

That gets his Uncle’s attention. Lance violently twitches, forcing an eye open. It locks onto him, hazy but critical. Despite being in obvious pain a hand flashes out, snapping onto to Arthur’s wrist, pulling the hand away from his face. The grip is firm abet weaker than Arthur’s expecting.

“Whoa, you might want to take it easily Uncle Lance. Wouldn’t want to pull any stitches. You were stabbed five times you know.”

“You,” His Uncle growls hatefully, eyes narrowing, “Get out of Arthur ya fuckin, slimy piece of shit, bastard.”

“That’s some strong language. And in front of your nephew. He’s watching you know,”

A loose flick and the demon frees its wrist, efficiently shoving his Uncle back down when he attempts to lunge outwards. The hash action causes Lance to grunt in obvious pain. A move towards the emergency call remote has the demon snatching it up and placing it on the small table just out of reach, tutting in disappointment.

“I’ll get ya. Mark my words…You’ll regret this,” His Uncle spits, his attempts at sitting foiled.  His face is pure revulsion and fury. That determination and fire is something Arthur’s never seen directed his way before.  _It’s all in vain. Nothing matters. Not anymore._

A teasing, “How? You can’t even move. Soon you’ll never move again.” The demon releases its hold on the IV and turns the control dial up to its max setting. Dismayed, Arthur watches the drug take quick effect, rapidly dulling his Uncle’s movements. Eventually, Lance just lies still and glares, even while his eyes are drooping shut.

“Don’t worry about your nephew. He’ll be safe with me. Since you care so much and all.” The glare faulters much to the demon’s renewed glee. The predatory buzz is back, coiled alongside a sensation of anticipation and pleasure.

“Arthur.” His Uncle’s voice loses its heat, softening. He’s struggling to stay conscience, drowsy, eyes shutting.

_‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Please. Stop. Please. PLEASE.’_

A knife is produced after a small struggle. The hinge, which usually allowed it to flip cleanly open, is stiff, jammed with blood. The keyring makes a clinking sound, hitting the side of the metal bed frame. Tap. Tap. Tap. It echoes through the room in time with the ticking clock.

“Now. How do we go about this in a way that won’t immediately alert the plebs?”

_‘NONONONO!’_

“Kindy slow bleed? Good choice.”

“Nighty night,” It stands upright. The chair squeaks. Blankets and paper-thin robe are pulled aside in an energetic flourish, revealing the assortment of bandages covering his Uncle’s chest and side. A second is spent in meticulous calculation. The knife is carefully positioned and thrust in. The demon waits for a beat before pushing forward against any resistance, twisting, then drawing out. Cold satisfaction. His Uncle’s fingers catch on Arthur’s retreating arm. This time, there is no strength behind the grasp, and it’s easily shrugged off.

“Not….You…r… Fa..ul…t...” The words are mumbled and slurred, swallowed up by the silent room. The clock on the wall ticks.

“Eh. Suppose we’ll look a bit suspicious if we stick around.”  

The blanket is tossed back into place, covering the reopened wound. They turn, strolling towards the door, practically skipping back down to the reception. Arthur can feel himself splitting, joy mixing in with panic and grief.

Just like his life, he’s falling to pieces. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to tumblr version [here,](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/184339272857/msa-time-travel-idea-part-25)


	20. Racing against the Clock (Lewis)

_Why is Arthur afraid of him?_ The question sits at the forefront of his mind, occupying his thoughts. Was it all him or was there something more, someone else, involved like Vivi suggests?

 _What can Lewis do to help someone who obviously doesn’t what it?_  At least, he’s pretty sure Arthur doesn’t want his help. Despite her instance, for Lewis to not jump to any hasty conclusion, he is definitely partly responsible for Arthur running off without them. If he’s not the cause of Arthur’s initial fear, then he is surely at fault for driving a wedge between them with his less than stela reaction to Arthur’s panic attack. The echo of anger, at himself and the situation, is distant but ever-present.  Lewis quickly shoves the unruly emotion away, focusing on the less concerning sense of guilt.  

Honestly, Lewis isn’t enjoying this unwanted return to self-doubt and emotional insecurity. These last few years, spent working at the family dinner, hanging with Arthur, and dating Vivi, have been his best by a long shot. Now all his old fears are back with a vengeance. In his front breast pocket, Arthur’s note seems unnaturally heavy and he resists the urge to pull it out and scan it for answers that didn’t exist. In his mind’s eye, every communication and interaction with Arthur flashes by. Was he too imposing? Too pushy.? Not friendly enough? Should he have stepped back and given Arthur more space? Mabey he’d give Arthur too much space?  

All the memories seem wrong now, which is knows can’t be right. Discontent grows. Lewis gives Vivi a light squeeze, trying to find a distraction from the building unease. Lewis is letting his current feelings colour his past recollections, and he needs to stop. This needs to be approached logically. Inadvertently, his free hand lifts to hover over his breast pocket. The piece of paper drags at his heart like a chain attached to a cement block, sinking slowly into the ocean.

“What are you thinking about?” The prompt breaks his worried silence. Vivi is staring pointedly, attention flicking between his hand and the pocket. This whole situation has got her wound into a ball of worried energy, jittery and irritable.

Lewis sighs to release tension, moving the hand to rub his eyes, “Just trying, and kind of failing, to find a rational explanation for stuff.” He lets the sentence hang so it can encompass all of everything. Arthur panicking, running away, Lance’s mysterious hospitalisation, being left stranded, and it all potentially being his fault.

“We can’t know why…” Vivi starts to reassure to which Lewis finishes quickly, “Without asking Arthur. I know…” He is still trying to incorporate it into this current mindset. He’s not been entirely successful but saying it out loud helps.  

Lewis continues doggedly, “But maybe, if we narrow the weird behaviour down to a particular point we’ll find some reason for it?”  _A reason that wasn’t him._  He doesn’t say the last part. He doesn’t need to. Despite his preference towards sitting and silently thinking through a problem, talking benefits them both.

Vivi shuffles a bit to lean into him, her jittery leg movement stops. “Yeah, I was thinking about that as well. It has to be recent because I’m sure one of us would have noticed if it was a long-term thing.”

Lewis frowns at the highway, offering, “We haven’t really spent a lot of time with Arthur this last few weeks. So I guess that makes a bit of sense.”

As if picking up on his line of thought, Vivi comments, “Two weeks ago, the first day we started painting the van, Arthur ran off and spent all that time in the bathroom. I kind to thought it was odd, but, you know, one extended trip to the bathroom isn’t really that big a deal.  But then he also sat in his room for the rest of the evening….”

Lewis grimaces, thinking back, sorting through his recollections. Arthur _had been_  awfully uncommunicative ad unsarcastically silent that day. Initially, he’d concluded that his friend was annoyed at him for ruining the budgeting, overspending on paint. It sounds dumb in hindsight, but it’s the first time in a long while Lewis remembers being unsure on the direction of Arthur’s thoughts or reaction to a problem.

“Maybe” He responds noncommittally, wounding how to describe the weird disconnect out loud.

“This is going to sound weird…” Vivi continues, tapping her food to show her renewed agitation, “But I swear his face was moving funny that day.”

“Moving funny?” Lewis raises a brow at the odd statement. She shrugs loosely, leaning into him a bit more, so he’s supporting her full weight.

“Yeah, it was like, his face was different. Strange. I don’t know. Is that weird?”

“A little,” Lewis admits, catching Vivi’s thoughtful expression. Together they mull over the conundrum in more comfortable silence. Despite managing to narrow down a potential start date, they make little progress on possible causes, leading to more frustration.

Finally, a navy-blue pick-up truck with a compacted cab and shallow flat-bed slows along the main road, pulling off and forcing them to shelve any further conversation.  Vivi is up and moving before Lewis gets a chance to really process the arrival, knocking both him and Mystery to the side. While Lewis picks himself up, Vivi hails the driver, a darker-haired, flannel-wearing middle-aged man. The man, probably Jamie, waves a response, jumping from the vehicle, meeting Vivi halfway.

“I take it you’re the couple looking to buy a truck?” Lewis hears a confused greeting as he draws close, following on Vivi’s heels. Jamie is giving both him and Vivi a perplexed expression. Between Vivi’s blue and his purple, they make quite the pair, so the hesitation isn’t entirely unfounded.

“Is this the pick-up? It’s small,” Vivi steps to the side, dodging around Jamie and his outstretched hand to stare at the truck, “I thought it would be bigger.”

“It’s compact,” Jamie grunts, swivelling awkwardly to track Vivi’s quick progress past, calling, “One of the reasons I’m selling actually, not enough space for equipment.” Lewis represses the twitch threatening at the corners of his mouth.  Vivi’s complete disregard of social queues is as amusing as it is exasperating.

“Hey, I’m Lewis,” He introduces, catching Jamie’s outstretched hand. If there is one thing Lewis abides by, it’s the idea that being friendly and making people like you pays off in the long run, even if it is emotionally exhausting and the last thing he really feels like doing.  Another grunt and the handshake is returned, “Name’s Jamie. Nice to meet you I suppose.”  Lewis is the subject of a critical once over and more confusion. The copious amount of purple tends to do that.

“Your cousin said this is good for an eight-hour drive? Is that true?” Vivi yells from where she is circling the truck. She hoists herself up, leaning in through one of the open windows, checking the interior.

“We have to get to a town called Tempo. It’s eight hours away,” Lewis elaborates quickly,  “The truck looks pretty new?”

“That’s because it is. The thing’s several years old but barely seen any use. What do you need to go all the way to Tempo for?”

Lewis starts to respond but hesitates when Vivi calls, “We’ll take it. $2500 right?”

“What,” Jamie stalls, turning to stare past him at Vivi, who is now crawling out from under the truck, where she’s presumably been checking for rust and or other defects, wiping dirt off her skirt.

“Right now?” He glances at Lewis as if to confirm, to which he nods, reinforcing her verdict. Neither of them knows a whole lot about cars, but they’ve spent enough time around Arthur that he trusts her ability to spot any potential problems.

“Yes. This second even…” Vivi presses.

Jamie, now squinting between them, narrows his eyes ever so slightly in obvious suspicion, “Yeah. I mean, there’s paperwork, we have to transfer the registration, and insurance…that’ll only take a few hours….You’re sure?”

“Definitely sure. Is it possible to do the paperwork stuff later? We really need to get going right this second.”

“Are you two in some sort of trouble…because I don’t want to be involved in none of that.”

Lewis waves the concern aside, projecting as much confidence as he can muster given how out of sorts he’s feeling. This is what all those hours spent gossiping and chatting with Tempo’s locals have prepared him for, convicting a random man to trust them not to screw him over.   “We’re not in any trouble or going to cause trouble. However, our friend might be. We need to find him as quickly as possible.”

“Right…” Jamie hesitates, expression clearing.

“He drove off with our only form of transport.” Sometimes, it’s best to give a bit of truth to build a better rapport.  

“That’s rough…” Jamie scowls but appears a little more accommodating, “I suppose we could sort something out. But I’ll be taking down both your details. If you go off and crash, I’m not taking any responsibility.” Lewis nods gratefully. Across the carpark, Vivi grins, relief splashed across her features, making the whole exchange worth it.

After paying the $2500, exchanging identification, contact details, signing a proof of sales, and a guarantee to register and insure the vehicle upon reaching their destination, they have their mode of transport. While Vivi jostles Jamie through the process, flicking through paperwork, and enlists the help of receptionist Claire to print and photocopy documents, Lewis finishes packing, throwing most of their bags into the empty truck-bed. Overall, in no small part due to Vivi’s perseverance, they end up leaving a mere two hours behind Arthur. Lewis has never been more appreciative of her  ‘charge blindly ahead’ attitude until now. Thank god one them doesn’t turn into a useless over-emotional lump at the first sign of misfortune.   _Does that make him a bad person?_

Both Jamie and Claire gather to watch their departure, expressions unreadable. The truck lurches awkwardly, Vivi acquainting herself with the unfamiliar size and weight. Lewis grips the inner door handle, a bit of motion sickness mixing in with worry and other more unwelcome emotions.  With Vivi focused entirely on driving, Lewis is left once again to think in silence. Till now, Lewis has been doing his best to ignore it, but there is no denying the uninvited trickle of anger, underscoring everything, growing steadily. A small part of it is directed at Arthur, for not telling them what was wrong and thinking he had to face his problems alone. A more significant portion of it is directed at himself, his lack of control, his failure to recognise Arthur’s hate as fear, and for feeling the emotion in the first place. Mostly, the anger is purposeless, a foundation for his worry, apprehension and fear. However, if Vivi is right. If something is messing with Arthur and causing this sharp divide between the two of them…

Lewis clenches his fist. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Link to tumblr version [here,](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/184543322127/msa-time-travel-idea-part-26)


	21. Racing against the Clock (Mystery)

Mystery watches his youngest charge, Vivi Yukino, strangle her new vehicle’s steering wheel and is disproportionately concerned. Human emotional drama is an unfortunately common occurrence and, in his experience, rarely leads to any significant long-term consequences. Usually, its effects are fleeting and far beneath his interests.

_When had that changed?_

  Mystery resists an inclination to climb onto Vivi’s lap least he risks distracting her and causing an accident. Instead, he watches, somewhat at a loss, while she glares at the road, tense and obviously worried for her missing friend’s wellbeing. The lack of room in the compact truck cab has Mystery squashed between the two humans, giving him a good view of both as they stew in silence, discontent rolling off them in angry waves. Lewis, equally upset by their third member’s sudden departure, is staring obsessively at the note Arthur had left behind. Not a habit which denotes a healthy mindset from what Mystery understands. Fortunately, he does not have to worry about distracting Lewis, and he leans his full weight into the other. His leaning gets him a scratch on the head but nothing more. An internal sigh and a minor physical huff of exasperation. There is not a lot a dog can do in these situations aside from offer small comforts. The movement does have the additional desired effect of catching Vivi’s attention. Her eyes flick in their direction. A few minutes later and they are pulling into a gas station.

  “Lewis. It’s your turn to drive,” Vivi orders, bringing the truck to a stop next to the appropriate pump. Lewis hastily hides the note and Mystery wonders who he thinks he is fooling with the action.

  “Sure. Sorry. Didn’t realise we’d been on the road for so long. I would have offered sooner.” There is some shuffling while everyone clambers onto solid ground, Vivi waving away the apology.

  “Don’t worry about it. I kind of like it. It feels like I’m driving a tractor around with how high up it is. You know, when compared to the van.”

  She holds the door for Mystery to exit. There is a convenient patch of grass adjacent to the gas station, and he knows what she wants of him. One of the few downsides to this dog form is the prerequisite that the humans meet his dog needs. At times such as these, he wishes that the youngest Yukino were aware of his true nature to save her from the additional, unneeded pressure. Luckily, Mystery is probably the best, most well-behaved, dog in existence because he’s done and jumping back into the truck before Lewis has finished refuelling.

  “Where are you going?” Lewis asks after Vivi, catching her sleeve when she shuts the door on him and turns towards the gas station’s attached burger stand. Mystery watches the humans share their small affectionate touches through the closed cab window. There has been a significant increase in this touchy-feely behaviour. Another indicator that all is not well.

  “I’m just grabbing breakfast. Lunch. Or whatever,” Vivi answers, walking backward a few steps, “You keep filling her up. I’ll get the grub.”

  Lewis nods, “Don’t get me anything with meat.”

  “You’re paranoid,” Vivi snorts, moving away.

  “If you worked in a diner you’d be paranoid too. Not everyone is as clean as my parents,” Lewis calls at her retreating form.

  “Give a wave when you’re done so I can pay for the gas as well,” Is Vivi's light response. Mystery observes Lewis’s dementor deflate the moment she is out of sight. The tall human is staring blankly at the petrol pump, mind obviously far from the task. Mystery places his paws near the window ledge, drawing close to the glass to get a better view. He does not believe he has ever seen the human in such a melancholic state, slumped and drooping.  _Concerning_.

  Ding. The pump clicks off, and Lewis does not seem to notice. Mystery, after another mental sigh, gives a loud yip to catch attention. Honestly, these human emotional states seemed to be as much a hindrance as they were a benefit. 

  Vivi returns not moments later with several packets of fries and three burgers, of which he is fed several meat paddies. All his dog food is gone with the van. It’s not a terrible loss, dog food being a close contender for the worst part of being a dog.  

  As they return to the highway, Mystery can’t help but admit that, as much as would criticise humans for their erratic and illogical behaviour, this disturbance has affected him in ways he could not have anticipated.  _When had Mystery lost that impartial distance, carefully cultivated and maintained over decades of human interactions? When had he started to care for the humans he had long sworn himself to?_ It has crept upon him like the summer fading slowly to autumn. All those blissful years spent pretending to be a dog and getting showed with attention and affection has blinded him to winters approach. This sense of attachment and concern is more binding than any oath.

  Of course, like many of his failures, it is only after the fact and long past the point of return, that he realises his blunder. Mystery cannot deny that he has grown to care. He cares not only for Vivi, a quirk he can attribute to duty, but also for her friends to which he has no obligation. Not only does he care, he cares immensely, about both their physical and emotional wellbeing. It is a grave misstep for a being of his longevity.

  Nevertheless, there is nothing to be done now but proceed according to his new priorities. It is a shame that he had not fully realised these priorities before Arthur’s flight. Mystery, being the only one to have reason to suspect supernatural foul play, could have perhaps acted to prevent it. After Arthur’s bright golden aura had simultaneously doubled in strength while also dulling in colour overnight, Mystery had been on the lookout for some form of interference. The sudden reduction of loving pets, riveting games of fetch-the-stick, and instances of Arthur chattering at him about his current interests,  also pointed towards Arthur having realised Mystery’s secret. An unfortunate encounter with another being like himself fit somewhat in explaining the sudden aversion to all things supernatural.

  Mystery has been biding his time while he worked to discover the extent of the human’s new knowledge. He had planned on pulling Arthur aside to offer an explanation, belay any understandable fear, and perhaps find a cause behind his changing aura. Now it is too late, and Mystery is left hoping that Arthur’s abrupt exit is a result of human silliness and not something more sinister.

  “Viv, can you pull up a map to the hospital. I think that’s the sign for the exit,” Lewis’s deeper voice breaks the silence which has been sitting about them like an itchy blanket for the past several hours. A quick glance at Vivi’s watch tells Mystery that it is almost 5 pm and they have been on the road for almost four hours since their last stop. His dog body has gone stiff with disuse. Usually, he would play up his dog persona and whine for a break. Today, he lets the façade rest, if only minimally.

  “Oh yeah. Sure,” Vivi pulls out her phone and begins typing, “We’ve been past the hospital a load of times. It’s in the middle of town on the far side of Milton High. Near the university and that new research centre.”

  As she talks, she pulls up the map, and, finding no space for on the cab’s cramped dashboard, holds it out for Lewis to see.

  “I know,” Lewis’s eyes flicker to the phone and back to the road. The indicator for the turn signal is flipped on. “But I don’t think I’ve ever actually been  _to_  the hospital. And this truck is harder to drive than the van, so there’s more risk of me taking a wrong turn and getting lost.”  

  Vivi nods in agreement, exhaling, propping up her arm so she can continue to hold the phone for Lewis, “You know, I bet this truck is close to the same weight as the van when you add up all the crap we carry around, but the van handles a million times smoother. Wonder why that is?”

  “Arthur does work on it obsessively. Maybe that has something to do with it?” Lewis points out before lapsing into silence his face pinched up in that strained way it does when he thinks of something unpleasant. Silence once again falls over the group.

  A traffic jam only servers to sour already frayed nerves, making Vivi jitterily and irritable and Lewis increasingly dourer. Thankfully, the negative vibes put out by the humans mostly disperses upon Vivi pointing out their destination fast approaching on the horizon. The pick-up truck, being too long for any of the hospital’s provided parking, means they are forced to circle the block several times over. They find a rest space outdoors, and a five-minute walk from their destination. Mystery watches in slight bewilderment as the humans take exemptional offence to the setback.  _More erratic human behaviour. Concerning._

  The sooner they find their third member, the sooner all his charges can re-establish an equilibrium amongst each other, allowing his own worry and concern to abate. Then- after seeing to whatever supernatural force is interfering with Arthur-he can begin restoring his distance. As much as Mystery has adored watching this small group grow into a family unit, building their positive emotional bonds and being included among them, these erratically negative mood shifts are a harsh reminder that humans are as fickle as they are short-lived.

  Mystery releases a tiered snuff, allowing Vivi to carry him against her chest, to hasten the crossing of several intersections all crawling with various forms of transport. Humans did have a tendency towards packing themselves onto smaller and smaller plots of land.  

  “Excuse me! Mam! Madam!”

  Their entry into the hospital is barred by a thin man in uniform grey. The stranger steps suddenly into Vivi’s path and Mystery has half a mind to growl in annoyance.

  “There are no animals allowed in the hospital. You’ll have to leave the dog outside.”

  “What,” Vivi almost barges straight into the stranger, and Mystery feels her grip tighten slightly in irritation, “Crap. Right. Forgot about that.”

  She swears under her breath. Once again, Mystery is reminded of this form’s disadvantages. Like the now fretting Vivi, he too forgets that dogs are often not welcome into human buildings.

  “You go ahead,” Vivi is speaking to Lewis, who hovers to the side, “I’ll take Mystery back to the truck.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yeah. Go find Arthur. That’s more important. This should only take me ten minutes.”

  When Lewis hesitates for a second too long she continues with a sympathetic hum, “I’ll probably beat you to the room anyway, even with a head start. Hospitals are like mazes and your sense of direction is terrible.”  

  A disgruntled but amused frown follows the joke. Lewis protests briefly, “That’s a bit unfair. I only got lost once,” turning. He continues into the building while Vivi spins, a few choice words of discontent directed at the still staring security guard, and powerwalks back in the direction they’d just come. They cut across several roads, dodging people and cars alike.

  It is not until they are back at the pick-up truck, Vivi having placed him on the ground so she can retrieve keys, that Mystery smells the tangy scent of a human who has had dealings with creatures not of this plane. A quick glance around and it is easy to spot the offending person. The man’s aura is warped and stained in several places, and he’s watching Vivi from several paces away. Mystery immediately lets out a small growl to alert Vivi to the potential danger. Usually, he would ignore such tainted humans, their presence, while not common, is hardly strange. Humans had an unfortunate tendency towards messing around with forces beyond their understanding. Today, with all the drama, he is on edge.

  Vivi’s attention snaps to him and then to their surroundings in search of his enacted distress. The man, wearing a scuffed leather jacket and donning an aggressive expression, pushes himself forward upon their combined attention. Mystery notes the wrappings and sling, holding one arm secured, signalling severe injury.  The smell of blood and infection confirms his suspicion. With a significant amount of facial bruising, this man is looking awfully mangled in Mystery’s expert opinion.

  “Hey. You got a moment?” The beat-up human asks in a gruff voice. Mystery growls from down by Vivi’s feet to discourage any potential aggression. The action gets him a quick once over and nothing more.

  “Saw you arrive with that dude in purple, spotin the purple hair-do. He doesn’t work at that weird-ass diner in Tempo, does he? Called ‘Pepper and salt’ or whatever.”

  “Do I know you?” Vivi asks shorty, putting both hands on her hips, glaring.

  The action gets a grunted, “No. But you might know the guy I’m after.  Goes by the name of Arthur. That ring any bells?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter matches up with [this](https://pi-cat000.tumblr.com/post/185058537957/msa-time-travel-idea-part-27) on Tumblr.


End file.
